Sarangheo, Ajhussi
by The Deepest Wells
Summary: "My first and last-Goblin's Bride." Extension to Goblin: The Lonely and Great God. Not AU, involves reincarnations of Kim Sun/Wang Yeo. Kim Shin/Ji Eun Tak. Eun Tak has returned in a new lifetime, but she's mortal: Goblin fears he will be left alone again and faces the choice to love or become a Deity himself. Updates Saturdays; please review! :) Title means "I love you, Mister."
1. The Goblin's Bride

**Welcome to my extended ending to Goblin! :) This has no AU elements, although I did have to get a little creative in figuring out Eun Tak's second life: she does have parents and companions at school, but they don't come up much in the story. Basically just a little more closure for fans like me who wanted to see more of the married life we got a glimpse of in Episode 16. This story will not, however, have any swearing or sex scenes.**

 **Enjoy and leave a review if it so pleases you. :)**

 **Brief glossary: Dokkaebi = "Goblin," Ajhussi = "married or superior man; equivalent to mister," Sarangheo/Saranghae = "I love you"**

I can't believe I've found him: I can't keep a smile from stretching across my face. Seeing him there, knowing what I remember of my past life hasn't been a dream or some strange specter, makes the images in my head all the more stark.

By some magic on the crisp Canadian air, the dandelion in my fingers responds to my wish—that he will turn around and recognize me—and casts its seeds to the wind. I count them as they drift away, and when I get to eighteen I stop. It's taken me an additional eighteen years, thankfully not as long as last time, to find him. I don't know how long he's waited before I could be born again. Time in heaven flew by so quickly.

I stare at him through the remnants of my dandelion. "I found you," I murmer, as though he can hear me.

The pain of the car crash slams back to me, but it doesn't cut down my smile: I made the sacrifice I intended to, and I came back. I can live a long life with him now, assuming he remembers and wants me back.

Canada . . . the day he told me he didn't think a sadness or a love could possibly last a thousand years. I swallow: maybe he still believes it. "I believe it could," I say. I can't muster the courage to speak louder, although I know he might not hear me. But his back shifts. Maybe he heard me, and hope spurs me on. His voice, as it has the last eighteen years, trickles through my mind unannounced.

 _"_ _Which one? Sadness or love?"_

"A sad love?"

My heart skips a beat when Kim Shin, my Mister and my Goblin, glances up at the flutter of dandelion seeds around him. He stands quickly, and I swallow: I hope with everything I have left that he's overjoyed to see me.

"Ajhussi," I say. He won't stop staring at me, and he's dropped his book besides the scattered tombstones over this familiar hill. I smile as I approach him; beyond all my nervousness, I can't help but be excited at his reaction. I've been waiting all my life, and years dead before I had the chance to be born again, for this moment, but I do not touch him. "Do you know who I am?" I ask cautiously.

A tear tracks down his cheek, stirring a joyful sting in my own eyes.

"My first and last . . ." he whispers.

I barely contain a triumphant, ecstatic laugh: he knows. He remembers.

"Goblin's Bride," he finishes.

Neither of us can speak for a long moment. I don't know where to start, taken aback by the sudden flood of emotions and memories I refused to let go of, even when Mr. Reaper told me I had my chance.

My Mister smiles at me, the smile filled with age and wisdom, but innate mischief and gentility. I reach up, unsure if I can or should touch him, and finger his tears away.

"How long has it been?" I asked. "Eighteen years?"

Ajhussi's smile begins to fall. "Thirty. You said you were going to run right there and back; where were you?"

I purse my lips. "I didn't know how long. God had some things he wanted to tell me, and preparing another way for me to come and see you took some time to arrange."

Ajhussi scoffs. "No doubt another punishment. Thirty years; ha!" He shakes his head. "Come. Let's go home."

Excited energy bubbles in my chest, and I trot after him as he retrieves his book and walks down the hill. "Is Mr. Reaper still at home? What are we going to do now? I'm only eighteen, you see; I won't be able to marry you for another two years, Mister."

"I'm a Dokkaebi; I can do anything."

I step into stride with his long legs. "You always say that. But what are you going to do about this?"

"I'll come up with something."

"Ajhussi . . . can I walk with you until I have to leave for my plane?" I asked.

"Yes."

I wonder what pattern he has for being sentimental. I want him to tell me he missed me and thinks I still look pretty, assuming he ever thought I looked nice at all.

"Ajhussi?"

"Yes?"

I bite my lip. He sounds irritated, or like he doesn't care. "Did you miss me? I missed you."

A smile threatens to tug at his mouth, and triumph flutters in me. "I see people come and go all the time. I miss all of them, but I've learned how to cope." Then he glances up at the sky. "When does your plane leave?'

I sidle up next to him. "In a few hours. Do you still not have a passport?"

"I get around easily enough on my own," he says. "How did you get one?"

He tries not to sound curious, but I know he's excited to learn what I've been up to. "My parents applied for one."

"Parents!" He shakes his head. "It would have been easier if you hadn't died."

I purse my lip and grab his arm. "Why? I like having parents, and I'm sure they'll like you too."

"In my experience, I find the fewer people you attach yourself to, or have for attachment's sake, the better off you are," he says. "Wang Yeo and my sister have moved on to their next and last lives, and while I find that I miss them they do not recall me, and are better off not remembering each other from their respective histories."

"It all sounds so sad, Mister," I say.

"Exactly." Then his eyes grow sharp, and he turns to me. His long fingers trace down my hair, stopping halfway down my head as though he expects my hair to be shorter. "But at least you came back to me." He swallows and peers into my eyes. "I missed you. Now we must start over."

"Start over!" I shake my head, grabbing his hand and folding it into my fingers. "No. I remember everything, Mister; we can just pick up where we left off. I'm going to stay by your side for a long time, you see. I have to leave for my plane now, but when we get home, we'll eat beef and be married and sing together just like we did before."

A smile once again creeps onto his face. "Of course."

Another thought occurs to me, and I gasp. "Mister! I haven't kissed you in a long time," I said. I reach up and press my lips tightly against his, unsure how to kiss him the way he did when he brought me home from Canada for the last time. But it's enough: he responds a little.

"It's still perfect," I say, then skip away. I have to catch my plane if I want to see him in Korea again. I turn and wave at him. "Sarangheo!" I call.

He just watches me as I leave, his gentle smile accenting his features. He doesn't turn away while he's in my sight; I hope he comes home quickly.

Yoo Kyung gives me an odd stare as we fly home. We came over because I described Canada to my school teacher—much kinder than my last one—and convinced her to raise the money for coming here, so my whole class is with me even though I just came over to find Ajhussi.

"Why are you so happy, Eun Tak?"

I smile. My birth name isn't Eun Tak in this lifetime, but at my request people usually call me by the name I'm familiar with. "I met someone," I say. "A friend of mine from Seoul."

When the plane takes off, I glance outside at Canada. I finger the maple leaf in my pocket, the one I plucked out of the sky for myself before I found Ajhussi.

"I haven't seen him in a while," I say. "But now I know he's all right, and I know how to find him."


	2. The Hours of Bipolar Disorder

**Dilz: Thanks so much! :D Let me know if there's ever anything I can do better: I'm suffering from Goblin withdrawals as well. ;)**

 **Diem Kieu: You found Goblin! :D Thanks for coming to my other story! I hope you like. X) DFTYA!**

 _Kim Shin watches as her plane lifts off. He'll leave in a few hours to wait for her at the airport. For now he wants to finish his book and live out the rest of his day as peacefully as he can. He wanders back to the gravesite he constructed for his loyal companions, the generations of them passed away, and sits down to continue reading._

 _But he can't focus. The glow of her bright and energetic smile comes to life in his mind. Tears flicker to the surface until he remembers she's alive again. He quickly banishes his sorrow: she's here for him again. And he won't let her go driving or anywhere else alone anymore._

 _Then his stomach gives a lurch: perhaps he sent her alone on the plane she would die on. He restlessly stares up at the sky. He doesn't even have the vulgar Grim Reaper around anymore to tell him if she's going to die or not. He huffs and manages to convince himself he can't do anything for her; besides, she arrived perfectly safely last time. Kim Shin forces himself to breathe and mutter at the gods, insisting they let her live a long life this time._

 _His book folds, forgotten, into his lap, and he lies down on the grass. He's used to staring up at the sky and thinking she's watching him. But now she's a part of him once more; he can't forget what she used to be like. He smiles. Now he can watch her grow up like he couldn't while he wandered the snowy plains of a land even Deity had no control over._

 _He stares at his fingers. He felt her hair again, after all this time . . . heard her voice as she called to him. "Ajhussi!" He hasn't heard her in so long. She kissed him again. His smile widens; her lips are so soft, but so distracted: he can't get her in a decently long kiss unless he starts it._

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak," he says, staring at the sky swelling with darkness of the night. He hopes she's safe on her plane. Then his brow furrows; if she has parents now, she might have friends, friends or boyfriends who would dare to take her time away from a Dokkaebi. He sits on the grass and stares towards the door, deep in the heart of Quebec, through which he can get home._

 _As though no fifty years and no car crash have separated him from his deepest happiness—his sad love—he thinks back on the only day and night they had together, as Goblin and his Bride. He won't waste a precious moment with her now. He wonders if she still wants to become a radio producer, if he'll even let her out of his home._

 _"_ _Not old enough," he mutters. She can marry him, he decides. She's his bride, regardless of how old or young. Even two years away from being a legal adult, she has the memories—and perhaps the same knowledge she'd attained—as the life before._

 _He decides to start walking to the door immediately. She won't be in Korea for a few hours. As he walks he suddenly studies his outfit: did it look good enough? Again, he has no Grim Reaper to ask about all this. He will have to play it by ear._

 _Kim Shin strides quickly past the milling crowds of the Canadian night and steps through the door of his hotel, only to come out the other side at his home in Korea. Even Duk Hwa isn't there, much less the company's CEO, and Kim Shin inhales the gentle quiet. He hears the ghostly echoes of Ji Eun Tak's laugh on the stairs, her sweet little voice echoing over the living room._

 _"_ _I love you, Ajhussi!" He shook his head that day: she'd been trying to sweet-talk him. Sweet-talking an immortal Goblin had no particular consequences, however, and she soon succumbed to giving him back the gifts he'd offered her on the day he thought he would die. He chuckles at the memory of her defeated but adorable expression._

 _Kim Shin glances at his watch and realizes it's not the watch she gave him. His eyes widen: he doesn't remember where he's kept the old watch all these years, but if things are to go back to the way they were before she went and left him he decides he must find it._

 _He scrambles to his bedroom, peering briefly in all of his dressers and on all of his desks. He can't find it, but does switch out his coat for one he deems more worthy before racing upstairs. He exhales slowly upon entering her old room—the scent of her is still there. He knows because he trapped it in there himself, for his own sake. He knew how to be lonely, but after she left he didn't want to try. Fifty years he mourned her absence, headed by a long rainy season, as he never had anyone before._

 _He realizes he set the watch down on the middle of her bed the day after she died, as though to freeze time in her room to keep her from leaving the house. But, of course, she moved downstairs to live with him: it did nothing, and wouldn't have anyway. He picks his watch up from the neatly made bed and stares at Mr. Buckwheat, who is still left beside the pillow._

 _Now neither of them will be lonely anymore._

 _He checks his old watch. The battery stopped long ago, and he summons his new watch from downstairs, quickly switching the power in them. Once he's reset the watch she gave him, he checks it again. There are still eleven hours until she gets home. He stares around, wondering if he's missing something, something important. He checks the fridge for steak and liquor, but there's plenty. He paces the downstairs: perhaps, if he can stop time, he can speed it up. He simply doesn't know how. If he can have visions of the past and future, perhaps he can make time faster or slower._

 _In his restlessness he decides to eat. Soon the meat has his mind off of her, but only just enough to keep him from obsessing. After he's finished he shuffles through her old things, in her room where he's slowed the process of aging completely. Her poetry book is in there, the one he wrote in while they were in Canada for the second time so many years ago._

 _There's a burn mark where his note used to be. He frowns at it, then up at the heavens._

 _"_ _You think you can erase everything," he mutters. "Well, she remembers me, and in all your awful punishments you can't do anything for it." He stubbornly marches downstairs and carefully writes a new note in the book. Now she knows what he means by this, so he can change the wording._

You were my first love.

 _He slows in his tempermental state as he writes it. The last time he wrote anything to Ji Eun Tak, he had to force himself through an epitaph. He burned it when he reached the shore where they met, where he told her he would leave, where he touched her hair. The sting of his tears returns to him, and he bites them back: she's alive know._

 _The eleven hours drag by—during some of which he attempts to get sleep but cannot slow down the racing of his mind—before he decides he'd better get to the airport. He switches out his coat again and races to the door. But she cannot see him in his hurry, so he slows and breathes carefully before he pushes his front door open, stepping right into the airport to meet once again his death and love._

 **Thanks for reading! :) Love to hear from you guys!**


	3. My Boyfriend is a Dokkaebi

**Diem Kieu: Hey, that's all fine with me; he is . . . well, he's a sub-deity. He has powers-like being able to walk in a door and come out somewhere completely different, or see someone's future-but he isn't actually a god over anything. XD Goblin is a great story, but for watching it's addicting and time-consuming. O.o I'll explain if you like. I gave you a short synopsis, but boy, are there details. O.o That hopefully come up. As soon as I get this ball rolling, it should work out great. :D Thanks so much! DFTYA!**

Yoo Kyung questions me the entire way home. She's so chattery I almost don't get any sleep: "Did you meet a boy? Is he famous? Is he cute? Is he rich? Is he young?" When she's sick of these questions she assumes it's a girl: "Is she the next life of your mother? How did she end up in Canada?"

I try to politely avoid the questions, but soon I'm tired. I miss the food and drink trolleys completely because of the chatter, and I don't eat anything during the whole flight. I finally flatten the airline pillow over my face and try to sleep. She's more invasive than the ghosts used to be.

But the moment Yoo Kyung is asleep, I start thinking about Ajhussi. I wonder what he's doing right now. I would be in my forties if I were still alive. I stare out at the window, happy it isn't raining: even if it is far away from where Ajhussi really controls the weather, it makes me feel warm and safe. I never liked rain, but now it's different. I hope he's happy.

The airlines didn't let me take matches or a lighter, and I knew they wouldn't. I fidget, wishing I could summon him. But I'm sitting by the window, so he would have to move Yoo Kyung and her best friend from my row. I smile, almost guilty, when I realize he would move them. He cut a car in half to save me. He looked so wonderful in his coat, walking out of the mist.

There's no moon out tonight, but there are billions of stars, mostly as the night progresses and we approach Korea. I try to drift off to sleep, and I succeed when I'm finally tired enough. But I dream about Ajhussi, the stroke of his fingers against my hair on the night we were married. It seems almost taken away from me, in some way, distant as though the heavens would part us one more time.

Yoo Kyung nudges me awake before Ajhussi can say he loves me, and I panic, thinking I've been killed again.

"Eun Tak!" she cries. She studies me for a confused moment, then pats my shoulder. "It's all right. I'm not going to hurt you." Then she chuckles. "Bad dream?"

I open my mouth to respond, but she marches right through it. "We're coming down now. We'll be home in a few minutes."

I stare over the lights of Incheon, then farther down to Seoul. I wonder which light is Mister's house: I never thought about it before now, but one of those belongs to him. I want to stand and fly like he does, right to where he lives. Maybe he'll kiss me if I go now.

But I'm a mortal, so I'm stuck here until the plane decides to land. My head slacks against the chair behind me, and I wish again for matches. Suddenly being with all of these other people is too much: I need my Ajhussi. I turn my head to the window as excited chatter rings amongst my classmates: they've never been abroad before, and while I haven't in this lifetime, I already know the excitement of being home. I smile: I have Ajhussi again, coming home.

My teacher counts all of us one more time as we leave the plane, and she tries to keep us all together, but I'm grateful when some of the students move ahead. I ask her if I can go as well to meet someone, and she allows me onward. I wander to the doors, wondering if he's even here. He didn't say he would come.

Disappointment sprouts in me, and I stare down at the floor. Now I'll have to wait until my parents come, but they don't even know I'm home yet—I thought Ajhussi would be here to take me back, but now I have to call my parents and wait for them to come.

I open my phone to call Omma, but then I hear Appa calling out for me. My head pops back up, and I smile when I see him. He waves at me like I wave at other people, like he's really excited to see me.

I nearly leave my luggage behind in my excitement, and I leap into my father's arms. Unlike Ajhussi, Appa is short and stocky, and his hair is already graying. I'm an only child again, but only because Appa is ill, and hasn't been able to have other children before or since. I'm glad he's here.

"I thought you were still at the hospital," I say, hoping he'll tell me everything is all right and he never has to go back again.

He smiles and musses my hair. "I wanted to come and see you, my little Goblin's Bride." Unlike my mother, he believes I have real memories from my former life, and now I can prove it to him when I take him to see Ajhussi later today, after I get some real sleep. "In-na is at the hospital now so I can be here with you."

"I love her," I said.

"I love her too."

Then my eyes widen. "Appa! I found the Dokkaebi!"

His eyes widen too; then he looks concerned. "Min . . ."

"Eun Tak," I insist. "My name is Ji Eun Tak."

"Min, I'm serious. I understand you feel you remember some things from your past life, but are you certain this is the right step to take? Where did you find the Goblin?"

I point behind me. "In Canada—," Then I pause. He's right in line of my finger: Kim Shin. I gasp and turn back to my father. "You see? He's right there! That's him: Kim Shin!" Then I hesitate. If I talk about Ajhussi now, he might lie and say he isn't a Goblin, that he doesn't know me at all. My lips curve down as I consider.

But he comes over, eyeing my father up and down.

"Obviously not a boyfriend," he says. "Who are you?"

I open my mouth to cut him off before he says something blatantly insulting—I let the other comment pass because he thinks out loud sometimes, and he's speaking formally at least—but my father cuts in. "I'm Min's appa. And who are you?"

One of Ajhussi's eyebrows shoots up. "Min." He glances at me, his eyes growing exasperated. I glance at the ground; he liked me better as an adult. Now I just irritate him more, I know. "And who is Min?"

I raise my hand timidly. "My name is Ji Min-hee. I asked to have the same name as before, but Deity could only give me the same last name."

Ajhussi lets it go and turns back to Appa. "I come with the rain and the snow." My eyes sink shut: he can't do this now. He needs to make a good first impression if I'm ever going to be able to see him again; he doesn't know how to handle it when I have relatives, except for curse them. He goes on for a minute, and then finishes. "I am a Goblin."

My father looks amused now. "And what are you doing with my daughter, Goblin?"

"She is my bride," he says. "I did not know she had come back, but now as she has made herself known to me I intend to take her back to my home."

"Come back?"

Now Appa acts like I've never told him anything, probably just to see if my story matches up with Ajhussi's. I bury my face in my hands and rub the sting out of my eyes: I need sleep, not a debate between my immortal husband and skeptical father.

"In her first life, she came to me as my bride," he says. "As my death and life." He sounds like he's narrating a morning drama, like the ones Mr. Reaper used to watch. "She was, and is still to me, Ji Eun Tak, the Goblin's Bride."

Appa muses over this, and a humorous glint passes through his eyes: now I'm confused. I can't tell what he thinks of my Mister. "How old are you?"

"A thousand years old," Ajhussi says without missing a beat. I furrow my brow, counting: if it's been fifty years since I came here, and ten years before since he told me he'd turned 939, I realize it really has been so long.

"And you are aware she is not even an adult?"

Ajhussi reaches for my hand, and I almost pull away for fear of pushing my parents away from him so soon. But his warm, long fingers entwine with mine, "delicate hands" as I recall him stating once. Memories, dreams I've only ever wished would come true and wondered if I had only worked up for myself, drift from his skin to mine.

He nods, suddenly solemn. "I've waited fifty years for her to come back. Her age does not matter to me, not after all this time."

Appa muses again, also solemn, but his gaze falls to my hand in Ajhussi's. I tug for it back; we can't be sentimental now, and after how characteristically aloof he's been upon my return I almost feel like his touch deserves to be avoided. But he keeps a firm grip; I hpoe he's not trying to prove something to Appa.

"Go home, Mr. Kim," Appa says, but he doesn't sound angry. He's not usually upset, and even when he is it's hard to tell, but I breathe a sigh of relief all the same. "Min will come home with me for now. You are welcome to come for dinner tonight and meet us, but I cannot hand my daughter over now."

"Would you like me to prove that I am a Dokkaebi?" Ajhussi says. I hear the challenge coloring his tone.

Appa holds up a hand. "It won't be necessary. I believe you; I simply need to talk to Min alone. She hasn't yet completed school, and if she plans to be a radio producer she must focus."

"Appa, I've told you, I have been a radio producer," I say. While I don't remember all of the details—specifically every fact in every class I need to know for tests—I remember enough that the classes I used to think were difficult are now almost dreadfully simple.

Ajhussi squeezes my hand. "She has," he says, "and she's good at it." He then turns his gaze to the ceiling of the airport. "Let me speak to Eun Tak for a moment, and I will not protest her going home with you. I will also join you for dinner later tonight."

Appa nods and steps back, but Ajhussi leads me away, through the airport door. I try to protest; my appa is still inside, but we're already in my old bedroom.

"The moment you can, Ji Eun Tak," he says, his voice now low, "come back. Come back to this room if you must, but come back." His arms circle my waist protectively, and he pulls me close to him. "You've been gone so long."

I stand there, in the peace of his warmth. My eyes drift closed.

 _"_ _Today was perfect. This morning, I woke up in his arms. I fried the eggs perfectly, and the radio show went more amazingly than we could have hoped."_ Visions of blood trickle into my eyes, followed by the possessive squeeze of his arms when he came to see my dead soul in the teahouse. The blood is replaced by tears suddenly. _"Everything had to be perfect to lead me to this moment."_

I spin around, and my face buries in his chest. He embraces me, then strokes his fingers down my head in the endearingly awkward pat of his.

"Why are you crying?" he asks. He sounds slightly uncomfortable.

The sound of his voice quells my pain, and I shiver with realization: I'm only eighteen. We have time. "First you left. Then I had to go. How many more times must we do this?"

"Never again," he says, his voice steeled with determination. He scares me, but he won't hurt me: he may be a Dokkaebi, but I'm his bride, and he wouldn't hurt me. "I'll never let you die, not until I can die as well." He pulls away, inspecting my tears. His eyes soften, and I wonder why I've seen his eyes so before. His smile is sweet and sad again.

I stare into those eyes, the eyes I missed so much. Now the weight of fifty years in heaven without him—heaven incomparable to the paradise I felt in my memories of my Kim Shin—begins to sink in. He fingers away my tears methodically.

"I had better get back to Appa," I whisper.

He nods and turns immediately, leaving no more room for sentiment before he opens the door and leads me back into the airport. I glance back at him, then smile: he's wearing the same coat he had when he came to rescue me from the kidnappers so many years ago.

"I like your coat," I say before stepping back into the airport to meet Appa. I'm rewarded with a brilliant smile before the door shuts behind me.

 **Thanks for reading! :) Let me know what you think! And we will get to the romantic part later, I promise. I have a nasty habit of writing kissing scenes. XD**


	4. Run Amuck

**Diem Kieu: She's a senior in high school: so this story deals a lot with supernatural/patterns of life and death. In terms of the show, and possibly Korean tradition, a human soul is reincarnated three times, four lives. The show ended when she was born into her second life, so now I have her as an eighteen-year old in this new one. Most people, thanks to the Grim Reapers, forget each lifetime after they die, but Eun Tak opted to remember; she died at 29 in her first life, the day after she married Kim Shin. I guess that's a little bit of context for you. Thanks! DFTYA!**

 **Angela273: Thank you so much, and welcome! I hope you enjoy it! :D I promise, I will keep updating. :)**

 **Queen Emily the Diligent: Bitte; thank you for reading! Enjoy: I hope there should be another chapter soon. :)**

 **Chapter 4 reviews will be responded to in Chapter 5, set for update next Saturday. :)**

 _Kim Shin immediately sets out to prepare. He has the opportunity to convince Eun Tak's Appa—Mr. Ji, as he recalls—that she is the Goblin's Bride, and belongs here, married as is her fate. His brow narrows as he wonders where her necklace is: she didn't have it on when she died. Maybe she left it here somewhere._

 _He smiles deviously to himself: it worked. She liked his coat. He fingers the sleeve proudly, then walks into the other room, pacing and trying to decide how he can possibly occupy his time waiting for her. In his flurry he suddenly remembers the necklace. He wants to make everything exactly as it had been._

 _But as he ruffles through her things—the ones she left in his room—his movements slow. Things can't be the same. Duk Hwa is on his deathbed, ready to go and meet his son, and his grandson Woo Bin is ready to take the position of serving the Dokkaebi. Unlike Duk Hwa had been, Woo Bin is a responsible child, and Kim Shin already looks forward to spending more time with the young boy._

 _Further than the first issue, however, the Grim Reaper is gone as well. Kim Shin, even though he has found the necklace and has it draped across his fingers, slows almost sorrowfully in his movement. Echoes of laughter around this house ghost back to him._

 _"_ _I need a Grim Reaper," he murmurs. He stands and walks to the door; no doubt another Grim Reaper has taken the place of Wang Yeo. He steps through the door and out of the store a block or two down from the teahouse. He marches down the rest of the street and knocks hastily on the door. It's just dawning here in Seoul: perhaps he can show up early for dinner if he finishes business with this new Reaper._

 _As he expected, the dark soul appears at the door with a confused expression. He looks Kim Shin up and down, and then his eyes light up with realization._

 _"_ _You! You're the Dokkaebi!"_

 _Kim Shin's eyes narrow . . . and he remembers he saw this Grim Reaper on that day when Eun Tak almost got killed in a bus accident. There were a dozen Grim Reapers lined up at the bus stop; this one had mentioned something about never seeing a miracle before. Good: he fears the Dokkaebi._

 _The Goblin steps into the teahouse, inspecting it. The colors are the same, but the atmosphere is different: it's gentler. Seemingly this Grim Reaper won't be as enjoyable as Wang Yeo used to be, but Kim Shin needs an insider to know if Eun Tak is safe._

 _"_ _I've come to ask a favor," Kim Shin says._

 _The Grim Reaper swallows. The Goblin smiles; he forgets what capability he wields sometimes, especially since he hasn't bothered to deal much with the outside world for fifty years._

 _"_ _I need someone to come and rent my home," he says. "A Grim Reaper, specifically. I need to know death announcements for Ji Eun Tak."_

 _"_ _I have a home of my own," the reaper replies, his voice shaking. "I can't rent yours; I've purchased one."_

 _Kim Shin considers this for a long moment. He's not patient enough to coerce a Grim Reaper; besides, Eun Tak is back, and he can be on his best behavior now. His mouth twitches up at the thought of kissing her . . . of being married tonight and living life to the fullest tomorrow and for the rest of her life._

 _Her life. He needs a Grim Reaper._

 _"_ _At least give me the information I need," Kim Shin persists. "Tell me whenever Ji Eun Tak gets a death announcement card, or I'll burn every card in this district and you'll never get your job done."_

 _The reaper's eyes widen. "Ji Eun Tak," he mutters. He shifts his gaze towards the Goblin periodically, as though to ensure he hasn't gone through with his threat yet. Kim Shin almost smiles, but this is serious: he needs this._

 _The reaper shuffles through a huge filing binder. "I have no Ji Eun Tak," he says. Then he halts. "Wait a minute. Yes, I do: she does have a death announcement card."_

 _Kim Shin inhales sharply, anger and anxiety beginning to bubble within, but he quiets them. "When?"_

 _"_ _She's over eighty years old, so she will die of natural causes," the reaper says, again throwing the Dokkaebi a concerned look. "I doubt you can do anything. Thankfully this will be the only time you get a death announcement for her." Then his brow furrows. "Isn't she your bride?"_

 _Kim Shin glances down at the filing binder, at the name clearly written: "Ji Eun Tak," and a birthdate of March 5, 1998. Then it occurs to him, in his confusion, that her name is no longer Ji Eun Tak._

 _"_ _Ji Min-hee," Kim Shin says, pushing the binder away. "Keep an eye on Ji Min-hee; she is eighteen years old and lives in Incheon. She is my bride." He points at the Grim Reaper. "If she dies, and you are the one to have neglected to tell me ahead of time—,"_

 _"_ _Yes, sir," the Grim Reaper says hastily. The Dokkaebi cuts off a satisfied smile and marches out the door. He stares up at the sky: it's only mid-morning. He doesn't want to eat right now, but he knows Eun Tak would._

 _He opens the door to enter the Grim Reaper's teahouse again and walks right into his home. He has to find out where she lives: no doubt she would be happy to eat two meals with him instead of just one, although her parents might not like it._

 _He puzzles over how to find her for a short moment until it occurs to him: ghosts. He's found her through them before. Whether she can see them or not in this life he's not sure; he berates himself for not looking to see if she has a birthmark again. But if she's still the Goblin's Bride, at least ghosts will respect that his desire to find her. He walks out the door once more, but doesn't disappear anywhere. He wanders the streets of Seoul . . . and finds his spirit brightening. The streets where he would wear her scarf, once tired and heavy, look bright. Even though the faces are different and the stores have altered, she's back, and he feels so much younger again. Not as though he's ever really felt young, not since the ages of Goryeo._

 _He hasn't walked three blocks before he sees Mr. Ji opening the door for Eun Tak to enter a tall apartment complex, built not three months ago. It looks like they're carrying more suitcases than she had with her coming out of the airport, and Kim Shin decides they must have just moved here. Why, he doesn't know, but a smile grows on his face: she lives so close by, and her parents won't be hard to convince. Even if he must wait two more years until she can marry him, he will wait by her side every day._

 _He walks right up to the door and almost walks in, then decides to grab one more thing from home. He steps into the door, in her room again, and steps back out into the apartment complex. He frowns: he doesn't know where they've gone._

 _"_ _Excuse me," Kim Shin says to an elderly staff member. "Does the Ji family live here?"_

 _The man's brow furrows. Kim Shin's eyes flicker: the man's future appears before him. He will go home to his family, be reprimanded by the grandmother of the house for not bringing home more money. She'll snap at him and say the children are starving. The vision cuts off before Kim Shin sees anything more, and while the phenomenon is strange he's seen all he needs to see._

 _"_ _Yes," the man says finally. "I helped the mother move in this afternoon. They're on the third floor, apartment 271. You must be Min-hee's Dokkaebi she told me about."_

 _Kim Shin holds up a hand to halt the man, steps through the door into a Subway store, and quickly purchases a foot-long. But as he steps back out, he steps right into his house. His brow furrows: he didn't mean to. He shakes his head—he feels like he's lost his concentration._

 _This time he gets it right, stepping straight into the apartment building._

 _"_ _Go home now," Kim Shin says. "Give this to your grandchildren, and tell your . . ." He pauses. Usually the vision reveals everything, but it never specified whether the woman was the man's sister or wife. "Tell your family you'll be able to secure a job in the next couple of weeks. Go to the Chunwoo Group and see what you can do for them: they are most likely to hire you."_

 _Tears bubble in the man's eyes. "Truly, you must be a god," he whispers._

 _"_ _Only a weak-hearted one." Kim Shin stares up at the ceiling. "Deity himself is a selfish creature."_

 _"_ _But he apparently listens when we pray, for he has sent you to me." The man lowers himself to the floor. "Thank you for saving us."_

 _Kim Shin resists the urge to smile: Ji Eun Tak would be happy to see this. "Go home now. Do what I have asked."_

 _The man nods and hurriedly runs out the door. Kim Shin frowns when he notices the man has a clubfoot. He shakes the thought away: he's done what he can. He trots up the stairs and finds 271, one of two apartment suites on the third floor. He knocks, and Mr. Ji comes to the door. His eyebrow lifts subtly when he sees Kim Shin._

 _"_ _It's not exactly time for dinner, unless goblins have different eating habits."_

 _"_ _I came to take Ji Eun Tak for lunch. Call it a date if you will," Kim Shin says, glancing inside. There are moving boxes everywhere. "Where is she?"_

 _Because Mr. Ji hasn't placed himself in the way, Kim Shin wanders inside. He snorts to himself: this place isn't deserving of Ji Eun Tak. Admittedly, it is nicer than most of the apartments in Seoul, but she must remember living in his house, secluded and well-furnished. The walls here are rather plain, and the carpet is mediocre; he prefers his wood floors anyway. And there are no candles anywhere._

 _"_ _She's asleep," Mr. Ji says, gesturing across the room to a white door with a simple knob on the other side. Kim Shin thinks there's something a bit deeper than irritation, something more like amusement or analysis. "She didn't get any rest on the plane ride, and she needs it."_

 _"_ _I'm sure she would be—," Kim Shin pauses. Perhaps being stubborn isn't the best way to do this, not with her father. He nods. "Of course. I'll get going, then." He opens the door, and glances behind him as he slips out the door and into Ji Eun Tak's room._

 _He breathes a sigh of relief as the door shuts behind him . . . and then his gaze falls on her. Her sleek black hair drapes exhaustedly across her face, and she hasn't bothered to change out of her school uniform. Unbidden tears sting in Kim Shin's eyes as he kneels beside her beautiful form: the last time he saw her relaxed like this, her soul had no longer been present. He raced right to the accident, but she'd already left with the Grim Reaper. His eyes sink shut: he'd sliced off the door of the car with his sword and lifted her body from the vehicle. His long fingers trembled as he brushed the blood from her gentle but cold skin. He didn't cry then, still suffering from shock._

 _Now he fingers the hair away from her face. It slides around and across his fingers like silk kelp, and he locks it behind her ear. She looks so peaceful there; he wonders what she's thinking about. He leans closer to her, and soon he's close enough to feel the warmth of her skin. His cheek innately touches hers, and need overwhelms his every other feeling. He's been parted often with people important to him, but he's never wanted and had the opportunity to make a human one with him in every way: Ji Eun Tak is different from the rest._

 _Kim Shin leans over her, and his lips ghost against her cheek, then deepen. She chuckles in her sleep, and he breaks away to watch._

 _Her eyes tiredly flicker open, and she glances up. "Good morning." She yawns. "Is Mr. Reaper awake yet? I'm ready to eat."_

 _The tears break out of his eyes now, but he smiles in spite of them. "It is time to eat. But Mr. Reaper is not here. Your parents are here."_

 _For a moment she looks confused. "My parents?" Then her eyes widen. "Oh."_

 _Kim Shin stands. "I've come to take you for lunch; we'll come back and eat dinner with them. But I think it's about time we were seen together." Possession takes over again. He feels a little fickle for all of this, and then decides that, in the case of seeing his bride again, he has every right to feel deeply. He lifts her from the bed and squeezes her close to him. "I've waited so long for you."_

 _"_ _You said you would wait two hundred years if need be, and you're like this after fifty?" she jokes. But then her little arms embrace him back in their endearing way, and she leans her head against his heart. He breathes deeply in the sweet silence, of the woman that is fated to belong to him secure in his arms with nothing present to harm her._

 _He pulls away to look at her. "I have steak at my home, if you'll come with me."_

 _Ji Eun Tak glances around the room. "Seeing as you're up here, I suppose my father knows." She nods with a bright smile. "Let's go."_

 _Kim Shin takes her hand and leads her straight through the door, filled with elation he feels he should keep down if he wants to retain any dignity. But the moment they step outside the door, Canadian music fills the air._

 _Kim Shin frowns. "Well, I didn't mean to come back here, but—," When he looks to his side, Ji Eun Tak is gone. "Ji Eun Tak?" He glances up and down the street, but there's no sign of her. "Ji Eun Tak!"_

 _He turns and marches straight back through the door, only to wind up in the Reaper's teahouse. Ji Eun Tak is standing there, looking confused, and so is the Grim Reaper. Kim Shin doesn't say anything, frustrated by this eruption in his power: he doesn't understand. He marches back through the door, right into her bedroom, but at least she came with him. Finally he makes the step one more time, and steps onto the dark oak floor of his room. He meant to go through his front door, but this is good enough._

 _"_ _Ajhussi . . ." Ji Eun Tak glances around, obviously confused. "What's going on?"_

 _His brow furrows. "I have no idea. I've never had this happen to me before. I wonder if it has anything to do with meeting you again."_

 _Ji Eun Tak's expression falls. "I'm sorry," she mumbles._

 _"_ _Sorry about what? Never mind; just come downstairs. I'll have you home in a couple of hours." He offers his hand again, and she takes it. This time the door opens normally, and he leads her downstairs. Soon the house is filled with the sizzle of steak. The Dokkaebi's empty longing is flooded with excitement while she clings to his arm, watching excitedly._

 _"_ _I don't get to eat beef very often," Ji Eun Tak says. "I guess I was fated to be poor, because both of my lives I get the best parents with not very much money." She wraps her arms around his waist and squeezes; he almost jolts enough to yank the pan off the stove. "I missed you, Ajhussi."_

 _Kim Shin smiles and glances down at her hands, joined around him. "Me too."_

 _She's still tired while they're eating, and after a few minutes he seats her in her lap. She falls asleep with her head on his shoulder._

 _Kim Shin's expression falls as he brushes his thumb across her shoulder._ You only have three lives left. Can't you let me die with you?


	5. In-na and the Dokkaebi

**Diem Kieu: No sorry! :) It's a lot to take in. She was given the chance to forget her life when she died (having been married to Kim Shin for only a day) at the age of 29, but she refused and said she would be back as quickly as possible. So she remembers, but she has to grow up again; Koreans become legal adults on the New Year's of their 20th year. Thanks for reading! :D DFTYA!**

 **Sadie: :D Thanks! I promise, I will update once a week now . . . except for a couple of exceptions at the end of April/beginning of May because I have lots of competitions, but after the second weekend of May I'll update every Saturday. :)**

 **Angela273: Weeeeeell, there's a good explanation for that . . . XD Sort of. Yeah! O.o I anticipate fully that Wang Yeo will be heavily involved.**

 **opheliablack: You're welcome, and thank you. :) That was a very touching review, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the story! Let me know if there's anything I can do to make it better.**

"I'm home!" I call out as I walk through my front door again. I smile as I remember lunch with Ajhussi; somehow I fell asleep, but when I woke up he prepared immediately to walk me home. My cheeks burn pink when I remember the kiss on my cheek.

Omma is there, and she gives me a strange look. I didn't get her appearance, even though she gave birth to me: she's like a model, with very dark skin and long, flowing hair. Her lips are always red, and her figure is perfect—Ji In-na.

"Home? Home from where? I thought you were asleep," she says. She has her loving but dangerous tone, when I can't tell if she's happy or upset to see me. "What have you been doing?"

My brow furrows. "Didn't Appa tell you? I went to have beef with Ajhussi."

Her arms cross, and her brow furrows back at mine. "He said you were in bed." Then she sighs. "I hope he doesn't have to go back to the hospital, not yet. I bargained pretty hard this time, but the lady at the desk was awfully stubborn." She huffs; it reminds me of Ajhussi, and I smile initially. She gives me a strange look, then turns away.

"Well, if you've been awake this whole time, you should probably get some real rest. Appa told me your Dokkaebi is coming over for dinner. What does he eat? Cats? Human souls?"

"He loves steak!" I exclaim excitedly. "Although we just had steak an hour ago. He likes fried eggs; he likes old-fashioned food. He likes sandwiches. He eats a lot of things."

Omma muses over this, then nods. "All right, then. I'll make fried egg, steak sandwiches with a side of human souls." I know she's joking, but for the first while getting to know her, she didn't sound like she ever said anything less than serious . . . just like Ajhussi.

"Whoa," I whisper. They're almost exactly alike.

I roll up my sleeves; I got plenty of sleep at Ajhussi's home, and now I can get to work. Omma and I put together rice cake soup and japchae; sadly we only have rice and a few scattered ingredients, but I hope Ajhussi won't think less of my parents for it.

He arrives early, with flowers. He gives me a wide smile when I answer the door, but then his brow furrows.

"I had to open three doors to get here," he murmurs. Then his frown disappears, and he lowers the flowers into my hand. They're buckwheat flowers.

"Lovers," I whisper, suddenly snapped back into a time long ago. I yearn for his touch in a sudden, uncalled-for moment. I want to go on trips with him; I want to go back, be his bride once again, awaken in his arms and be a PD with a husband at home. I lean up to kiss him, only to hear my mother clear her throat. I abruptly back away.

My mother looks him up and down; he puffs up in response. I want to warn one of them off . . . but I'm not sure who will be injured.

Omma starts. "You don't look attractive enough to be a Dokkaebi."

Ajhussi doesn't miss a beat, and I nearly cower in the corner. "You aren't young enough to be Eun Tak's mother. I suppose neither of us should be here."

Unlike what perhaps Ajhussi expected, she's not offended at all. But neither of them are deterred. "But I assume you are the Dokkaebi _Min-hee_ has been talking about, since you've invaded my home and nearly kissed my daughter."

"I did not invade; _Eun Tak_ invited me inside," Ajhussi says. He sniffs slightly, then turns to me. "Rice?"

I nod, only too glad to get away from this banter. Hopefully they'll grow to like each other and stop insulting each other. But as I wander into the kitchen, they continue on. I quickly set my buckwheat flowers down on the kitchen counter to dish the food up; I also call for Appa to come down to eat.

Even over dinner, Omma and Ajhussi don't stop either assessing each other or bantering. I turn pink; after trying to halt their retorts three times, I have to give up. Appa looks uncomfortable too.

Finally Ajhussi brings up something about the hospital, and Omma snorts. "They keep taking Jae Sun." Then Omma grows solemn, and I almost chastise Ajhussi for saying anything. "His parents lived on the streets as drunken beasts, and he has many health problems because of them. Min-hee is our little miracle; she probably shouldn't have been born."

Ajhussi's eyes widen, and he turns to me. He quickly checks the back of my neck, and I jolt. His fingers trace along my birthmark, my new one: it's in the same place as the first one, but it looks different now. I don't get to see it very often, because I don't have time to just stare at it in the mirror, but Omma told me about it before.

"So are you still a Special Case, then?" he murmurs. Then he glances at Appa, his brow furrowing. His eyes widen. "You recognize me, don't you?"

Appa peers, and Omma grunts before slipping his glasses out of her pocket and over his eyes. Appa's eyes widen back at Ajhussi.

"You're the man who blessed me," he whispers. "You healed my ailments for three weeks . . . when? Almost nineteen years ago now? So I could work while In-na recovered."

Ajhussi nods carefully. "You weren't able to have children before then, and you haven't since." Ajhussi glances at me again. "You aren't meant to live."

My eyes squeeze shut. "You keep saying that!" I shake my head. "Am I ever going to be meant to live? No wonder I saw a Grim Reaper. I'll probably see another one next year."

"Just because you aren't meant to live . . ." Ajhussi smiles gently, and his hand braces my cheek. "Doesn't mean I don't want you to."

Omma clears her throat again, glaring at Ajhussi. He snaps out of my gaze, and he glares back at Omma while he eats. She eats as well, and the table settles into tense quiet. She glances between me and Ajhussi; he glances between her and me.

Ajhussi quietly takes his leave later in the evening, after we've eaten. He doesn't do the dishes, as I expect of him. But Omma teases him about it, and he retorts again. Appa looks even more uncomfortable, although after what Ajhussi said about Appa, there's a gleam in his eye. Now I realize why I'm a Special Case . . . why I'm still the Goblin's Bride. I almost would think this life too easy, except for how terrible Ajhussi is making himself look in front of my parents.

He doesn't stop there: after giving my mother a solid, deep look, he presses a lingering kiss to my cheek and steps out the door.

I wince, not willing to look Omma in the eye. Then she speaks, her voice low and intense.

"Marry him, Min-hee."

My eyes widen. "Omma?"

A huge grin—I only now recognize how much she's been suppressing it—spreads on her face. "He is as much like me as you are like your father. Marry him; he'll take care of you as I have. I see it all over him. And he loves you." She sighs. "I admit, I never believed your story until I went and spoke to three different fortunetellers today. They all proclaimed my daughter to be the bride of the Dokkaebi."

I couldn't keep my grin down now. "Thank you, Omma!" I leaped forward and embraced her solidly. "Thank you so much!"

"Just don't marry him now, Min-hee; you're still too young." Omma pulls away, and her expression grows grave. "Also, I have news for you. Come and sit down upstairs. I didn't want to tell you this now, but I'm afraid I have no other time."

My head cocks. "What is it, Omma?"

"I had a hard time getting Appa out of the hospital because he's going back. He has a hereditary blood cancer now, and they have to work on it as quickly as possible." Omma bites her lip. "But I fear, Min-hee, that he will not be around much longer."

Of course, I feel the impact of what she has to say . . . but it's immediately obvious to me how much more she will struggle when Appa dies. She never cries, and right now all I can do is embrace her. I can't even tell her I feel sorry for her: she'll deny she feels any pain. No doubt they will hold each other tonight, perhaps cry together. I remember, as a young girl, when Appa would come home, and Omma would pull me into the bedroom. We would all huddle, and they would be tense.

When I wander up to bed later in the night, I pray. I don't even know who I'm praying to: I just know Ajhussi will hear me, and maybe some other god will protect Ajhussi while I'm still growing up. But tonight my prayers change, because I know Ajhussi is okay. I pray I can still marry him, and we'll live a long and happy life together.

But as I rest later in the night, a chill overcomes me. Beautiful as this life is, it's so fragile. Shards of glass surround me on all sides.

Perhaps Omma is right: after my last lifetime, I shouldn't drive alone.

 **Sorry the chapter is so short! :P I'm headed to the International Aca Deca finals, and my muse is not functioning. :( But they will get longer when I have more time, I promise. :)**


	6. Tell Him

**Diem Kieu: You're welcome. :D Oh, I can't wait to see those! :D Hey, that's fine; I'll answer questions. Fortune tellers only come up once in the entire series, and she's a bit crazy during the two instances that you see her, but basically she talks to one of the minor-major characters-the Goblin's sister, who will come up in this story eventually-and warns her about falling in love with a Grim Reaper (Jeosang-saja). DFTYA!**

 **Angela273: Thanks! And thanks for that too! XD I leave in 10 days. O.o 10-day heart attack . . .**

 **mangafan0729: Thank you so much; I hope you enjoy it! :D The chapters won't be long or particularly intricate for a while, probably not until May, but I hope it works out! And thanks for being specific in your review; I appreciate that. :)**

 **Meiyami: XD I'm glad you like it! Right? I felt so . . . unfinished. :P Hence writing a fic. I hope you like! I promise lots of angst (and a kissing scene . . . SPOILERS! O.o) Thus I shall do my best to mend the hole in both our hearts.**

 **JT: Dang it, I am so sorry! XD I finished writing all of these last night and thought I had uploaded . . . thanks for the review, I had totally forgotten. XD**

 _Kim Shin doesn't debate his decision. He's let her father be healed for another two weeks, just to prolong his life a little. He eats dinner with Eun Tak's family frequently, and as quiet as Jae Sun is, Kim Shin enjoys bantering with In-na. He watches over the months as his decision to heal Jae Sun for such a short span of time leaves In-na pregnant once more: mostly Kim Shin feels slightly guilty about allowing Jae Sun to die someday and taking Eun Tak away from her mother, so he can allow another child to come and be with In-na._

 _And thankfully the goddess Samshin appears to have agreed._

 _Soon after the baby is born, Jae Sun can't hold on much longer. Eun Tak will be an adult at the new year; Kim Shin can't keep him alive anymore. But he's grown attached to Jae Sun, who is brilliant and happy just like his daughter._

 _Kim Shin didn't want to see Jae Sun on his deathbed, but he's standing here now. He wanted to warn Ji Eun Tak; the Grim Reaper told him—when Kim Shin demanded the information—if Jae Sun would die. But now Jae Sun is breathing his last . . . and she already knows. Kim Shin found her scarf and has brought it for consolation, if he possibly can console her._

 _He remembers what he told Wang Yeo about death when Chairman Yoo died. Exact circumstances of death were best left undiscovered._

 _Kim Shin stands in the corner. Eun Tak doesn't know he's there, he's sure; In-na stands at her husband's bed, her fingers entwined with his as she holds her newborn in her free arm. Eun Tak is close to tears, and Kim Shin winces at the patter of rain outside. He never intended to care so much about Jae Sun, but he's grown attached again, even though Woo Bin is young and Eun Tak is here forever. He expected not to be sorrowful until Eun Tak's life drew to a close once again._

 _"_ _Dokkaebi," Jae Sun rasps. Kim Shin doesn't perk up, but he hears. "In-na, find the Dokkaebi. I wish to speak to him."_

 _Kim Shin halts time and steps out from his corner. His brow furrows: while time has stopped, he still senses movement. It's as though he hasn't completely stopped time, just slowed it a little. He stares at Jae Sun, whose eyes are slowly widening._

 _"_ _I'm here," Kim Shin says, unsure what else to do. "Just say what you wish to say." He steps back and releases time; Jae Sun snaps out of the warp, staring suddenly up at where Kim Shin had stood. He glances into the shadows, peering until his weakened eyes soften._

 _"_ _Tell the Dokkaebi," he whispers, glancing up at In-na, "that his very step and his very life is one miracle after another. Tell him he must marry my daughter. Tell him he must care for Ji . . . Eun Tak, my little . . . Eun Tak. But he must not let his focus fall from the rest of the world. These people are needy, and they need him. He saved my life and gave me two beautiful children." He exhales shakily; then he reaches up and kisses his wife's hand with his quickly deteriorating strength. "I love you, my In-na. Do not be hasty to join me in heaven: I will always be here with you."_

 _Kim Shin gaze falls as he feels Jae Sun leave his mortal body. There is a Grim Reaper standing there, and while In-na mourns in Eun Tak's arms, the Reaper leads his charge away. Kim Shin stands up a little taller when the spirit of Jae Sun leans forward to kiss his wife on the cheek once more. He looks so peaceful now, released from all of his illnesses. He nods to Eun Tak's father, who smiles in return before he is led out the door and to the teahouse._

 _The Dokkaebi is patient, and he waits for over an hour before Eun Tak is composed enough to let the doctors back in. Jae Sun's is taken, and In-na—through her tears and the heartache Kim Shin once felt himself—leaves to make funeral preparations. He knows she has no family to help her, and wonders if he can convince some ghosts to assist . . . perhaps bring a sandwich occasionally._

 _Then his gaze drifts to Eun Tak. She stays in the room while they take her father away, while the minutes drift by and her family leaves. She looks down, stunned, but there are only a few tears in her eyes._

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak."_

 _She glances up hurriedly, then rushes to him. She barrels against his torso, and he wraps his arms around her. She sobs there for a long time, and while he feels slightly uncomfortable, he also feels the solemnity of this on his bride's shoulders, the pain in his own core._

 _It seems like she can't even form words, not after twenty minutes, not after thirty. Kim Shin pushes her away just long enough to pull the scarf from his side. Her sobbing subsides as he wraps it around her neck. She still doesn't speak, however._

 _He walks her back, not to her home, but to his. He lets her inside, and she numbly steps into the main room. She somehow doesn't notice where she is because she walks straight in the direction where her room would be, where Kim Shin's room is. Then she stops and spins around._

 _"_ _Ajhussi?"_

 _He extends a hand, and she takes it; she moves slowly, like she's walking through fresh, knee-deep mud._

 _"_ _I brought you here because your mother needs some time," he says._

 _Eun Tak's eyes widen at him. "No! She needs help!"_

 _"_ _No, not yet," he insists. "I brought you here because your father asked me to do this. He asked me to marry you quickly."_

 _Her brow furrows. "After the funeral. I must help Omma. You may not think death is a reason to be sorrowful, but I loved Appa! I'll marry you after, Ajhussi."_

 _Kim Shin pauses, then nods. "Me too. I grew to care for your father . . ." He doesn't get any further before she begins to sob softly, trying to hold herself back but rendered incapable. Kim Shin brings her close to him, and distraught as he is, he finds peace there. He leans on her just enough to save his energy._

 _But he respects her wishes and decides to wait until after the funeral; besides, when she is an adult it will be easier._

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak," he whispers. She sniffles and backs away from him, staring at the stain of her tears on his white turtleneck. She reaches up to brush it off, but a flash of soft red behind Kim Shin's back halts her movment. Her jaw softly drops inspite of herself as he loops the scarf around her neck and gently ties it off._

 _She fingers the scarf, but her tears still fall into it. He brings her inside, onto his couch, and holds her to his chest. "Three times now you've told me that those left behind should be grateful for the love they received. Do not always cry; laugh sometimes." He tilts her jaw until she reluctantly glances into his eyes. He strokes her hair back, and memories flood back to him as they have been for the past . . . almost year and a half since she came back. Everything she does, every time they touch, he feels stirrings of years gone by. But they are not often alone: now they are. "Laughing is part what makes you bright."_

 _She still doesn't look convinced, not quite comforted. He frames her face with his fingers and lowers his lips gently against hers, awakened by her soft response. He tastes her tears, and she does not move much, but he nudges the kiss against her. She finally kisses him back. Dizziness dances lightly through his head, and his arms lower to her torso to hold her. She is not ready for passion, not now. He holds himself distant, then decides to deepen his contact._

 _Kim Shin eases away; only when the warm brush of her lips is gone does he open his eyes. She smiles sadly, then embraces him._

 _"_ _I am grateful for the love I have received," she assures him, her voice still broken, "and for the love I still have now. But . . . since I'm a student again, can't I be sad?" She bites her lip. "That my father, the only father I've ever known, is gone?"_

 _Kim Shin feels his weak-hearted sympathy, and after an inner debate he succumbs to it. "Of course." He brushes her tears away. "Just do not be sad for too long."_

 _Her smile is happier this time. "Ajhussi . . ."_

 _His eyebrow lifts._

 _"_ _Sarangheo," she finishes._

 _He smiles back at her. "Me too. Saranghae."_

 _He takes her back home when he realizes she's falling asleep. In-na is already in bed by the time they get back, and young Tae-shin is already asleep as well. He looks familiar to Kim Shin—even though he is but a few months old—and the Dokkaebi decides to keep a special eye on him._

 _Kim Shin leads Ji Eun Tak upstairs to her bedroom. He doesn't trust his powers regarding the doors anymore, and he's been trying to break his habit of using them, although he is frustrated and thinks to look into it._

 _"_ _Ajhussi . . ."_

 _Kim Shin stops at her door and turns back to look at her._

 _"_ _Please don't ask me to think about a wedding until after Appa's funeral," she says, biting her lip. She looks about ready to burst into tears again, but she breathes shakily and holds it back. "Could you help us at all? Omma doesn't have enough money for this."_

 _"_ _Always money with you," Kim Shin mutters. Then he sighs. "Of course I will." He strokes her head, glances down at her scarf: it looks so right looped around her neck. It was never meant for him. Then his lips stretch into a gentle, but certainly triumphant, smile. "I may be more capable of arranging a funeral than you can imagine."_

 _He kisses her on the forehead before letting her back into her room to sleep. He walks slowly home . . . and as he does he sees a lonely young woman on the street. He peers, straining to see her future, but the vision attempting to flicker into his gaze snaps away and refuses to come back._

 _Something is most certainly wrong._

 _He stares up at where Ji Eun Tak's bedroom light should be off and smiles, but uncertainty knocks him away. He turns to the heavens._

 _"_ _I'm finished with letting her go," he challenges. "Don't try to tear us apart again."_

 _Thunder, thunder he initiates, is his only response. He scoffs at the skies and continues home. Thankfully it doesn't rain; Eun Tak is home, and he is determined to be in a good mood._


	7. Happy New Year

**Diem Kieu: I think you'll get the hang of it. :) If you ever get the chance, you should totally watch Goblin; it'll help this make a lot more sense. XD But if not that's not a bad thing; Goblin just happens to be the best-written, angsty, exciting, romantic fantasy since . . . well . . . anything. :D Maybe when I come back and edit I'll add funeral . . . DFTYA!**

With Ajhussi's help, the funeral goes on well enough: we don't have any struggles with money at all. Omma and I cry frequently during the service, and she is sad for a long time afterwards. I miss Appa, but Ajhussi reminds us all to smile. Months pass from the funeral. Ajhussi still doesn't ask me to marry him, not yet. I start to grow worried.

He offers to pay for my college, and for Omma's apartment, but she refuses the latter. I accept his willingness to pay for me, though . . . but I'm sad because he makes no romantic move at all.

Omma is busy with my younger brother, Tae-shin, most of the time. I wish I could help her, but I have studies I need to finish; thankfully she understands. But she is so busy, and we spend so little time together, that the new year comes and goes without any recognition from her. Now she has to work, since Appa is gone. She gets a job at Chunwoo Group, for which I am grateful. But now when I come home and say I've arrived, there's no one I can say it to. The house is so empty.

But once, when I walk in there, I find Ajhussi on the other side. He smiles, although he looks a little confused.

"How did you get in?" I ask, happy to see him but sad at how alone I feel all the time now. I only see him once every week or so, as though he doesn't care as much as he used to, or as though he's happy enough to have me back and doesn't want to get married again.

Ajhussi glances back at my bedroom door. "I meant to go to the Jeosang-saja's teahouse and ended up here. Then I couldn't get back out." He shook his head. "But I came to get you. A long time ago you told me about today."

My brow furrows. "What is today?"

"The New Year!" Ajhussi exclaims, reaching for my hand. He smiles and nods to the door; I'm excited to see him this way, unusually occupied as he acted so long ago. He leads me out my door. "Where do you want to go? You'll be an adult in a few hours."

I ponder the idea of drinking again . . . and chances are soju won't taste so bad as it did the first time.

"What do you want to do?" I ask.

He looks startled, but then he glances outside. The sun is setting. "Let's go on a trip," he says. "I haven't seen you enough lately, and I have something I need to tell you."

He doesn't open any doors, although I think he's trying to: he looks confused now, as they aren't working, but he does have his car with him. He already has wine glasses in the back, and I can smell steak. I haven't eaten steak with him since he came back; he always came to eat with my family, but now it's just the two of us.

"How is Omma getting on?" I ask. He drives out of Seoul, up towards an old hill.

He doesn't respond for a moment. "She is a hard worker," he says. "And she loves her work. But I see sadness in her all the time." He glances back at me. "How long do you think it will be before she stops mourning?"

I frown at him. "Well, how long did you take before the rainy season stopped? Omma has only been without Appa for a few months!"

He waffles for a moment, shrugs. "I didn't take too long, as you told me not to. But I suppose mortals mourn longer; I have gotten used to it, after all."

"You say that all the time," I say. "But I think you missed me."

He doesn't answer; he pulls up to a stone temple. My eyes widen when I see my name inside the open building, written in thick ink on a tablet heading a candle. Ajhussi opens the door for me, and when I step out he leads me to a room off to the side, with a set of three couches and a thousand candles.

The candles get me thinking.

"Ajhussi, can I still summon you?"

He shrugs. "You are a Special Case, aren't you?"

I shake my head. "You said I'm a Special Case. I just have the birthmark because you did something to me; I can't see ghosts right now. I recognized a Grim Reaper because I know how to do it, but I can't see them with their hats. Do you think I can summon you?"

He lifts my hair and glances at my birthmark. "It's a character this time," he says. "'Trial.'"

I stiffen. "What does it mean by 'trial'?"

Ajhussi turns away and sets down his sacks of food. "I don't know," he says. "You have it, so even if you can't see ghosts you can probably summon me." He squeezes my shoulders and presses a kiss to my forehead. "You are the Goblin's Bride, after all."

I smile in spite of myself. "Ajhussi, did you bring soju?"

He scoffs. "It isn't midnight yet; you can't drink it." Then he glances at the pile of sacks. "I brought something much better. Come sit down."

He cooks steak outside; while chicken gizzards at a food cart still would have been good enough, I asked what he wanted to do, and now we're doing it. We don't talk much as he cooks, but I don't need it: it's enough to have him there.

After we eat, I sit quietly in his arms. I'm tired . . . but I'm almost an adult for the second time. He checks his watch periodically, as though waiting more than I am for the new year. The hours tick by . . . I fall asleep where I am a few times, but I can't stay asleep for long, waiting for what he has to say.

"Ji Eun Tak," he says finally. "It is midnight now." He braces my face upward, and the light of the candles around us flickers in his eyes like the stars I've never dared to count. "Will you be the Goblin's Bride again? And not just for this lifetime . . . but every lifetime after?"

"You just don't want to ask two more times," I say. But then I smile. He still looks so sad deep down, but there's happiness with it somehow. I reach forward and plant my lips on his, only to be drawn into a lengthy, hopeful kiss; he's so warm, and in spite of how harsh he can be at times, he is only the gentlest of beings right now. His fingers frame my face as they always do, and I indulge in the feeling of them.

Finally he pulls away, but only enough to dot kisses along my jaw, slowly and methodically. I embrace him and lean my head on his shoulder.

"Ji Eun Tak?"

"Yes?"

"You haven't said you will yet," he reminds me.

I chuckle. "Of course I will." I rub his back, squeezing him close to me. My fingers travel up his neck into his hair; it drifts through my hands, escaping my grasp as I move.

He breathes a gentle sigh against me. "Tonight? Right here?"

I smack his shoulder. "Ajhussi! I can't yet! I have to tell Omma, and get a dress. Besides, even a Dokkaebi needs authority from somewhere; you need the holy water first."

"I already talked to In-na. Your wedding dress is still in my room, and the holy water is not hard to find." He pulls away from me and squares my shoulders. "Will you do it tonight? I'm serious about this."

I shake my head. "No. I have to say goodbye to Omma, even if you did tell her. At least wait until this weekend; I still have to get to classes later this week, you know."

His brow furrows, and he looks ready to protest. I shake my head. "Ajhussi, if you rush it too much, the magic goes away." I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss his cheek. "This weekend. We'll do it this weekend, Ajhussi. Saturday evening; then we can have Sunday together."

Ajhussi finally subjects to what I have to say. But I fall asleep too quickly; by the time I wake up I'm home. Omma is already at work; it's late in the day.

"Happy new year," I whisper, thinking of Ajhussi. Then my gaze turns to my window, and my eyes widen. I scramble to my bedside and glance down, disbelieving, at the sidewalk. "Mr. Reaper?! Boss?!"

 **Last short chapter, I promise. But sadly there will be no updates this Saturday. :( I will be in Wisconsin for an academic competition . . . and there will be no updates the first two weeks of May either. I will be in Couer d'Laine for an orchestra competition and then a writers' conference in Provo on those weekends. Happy reading, and thanks for all the support! :)**


	8. The Lion and the Sun

**Thank you all for your amazing reviews, and for following/favoriting! I'm sorry this took so long . . . consistent updates are going to take a while to come back. I wasn't anticipating taking online classes this summer. Again, thanks for your patience, and I love hearing from you all! The story will make its huge start in the next chapter . . . where the plot really begins.**

 _Now Kim Shin can't open doors to anything. He can't see futures; he tried to run away when he saw his sister and Wang Yeo walking towards him on the sidewalk, but he ended up dizzy in the building he opened a door to. Now restaurant guests eye him uncertainly until he realizes his mistake and slips back outside._

 _He doesn't want to interfere with them right now; their faces remind him of too much, regrets and lifetimes they won't remember but that will trigger anger in his already perplexed mind. He dodges them on the way back to his car, unable to see anything of their futures or pasts._

 _"_ _Excuse me, sir," Wang Yeo calls out. Kim Shin's eyes roll shut; he doesn't want this right now. But he turns around, giving Wang Yeo his most intimidating stare. His hand entwined with Kim Sun's, he walks right up to the Dokkaebi. Kim Shin recoils in sarcastic disgust and wishes the Grim Reaper was here to understand his playful disdain._

 _But there is just a detective standing before him; he saw enough of Lee Hyuk when he could still see lifetimes. He knows where these two new people come from._

 _"_ _An elderly woman told us we could look to you for a home," Lee Hyuk says. "My wife does not want to honeymoon in an apartment, or a hotel."_

 _"_ _I like your home," Sunny cuts in. "And the old woman told us it was up for rent."_

Old woman . . . _Kim Shin finally decides it had to be Samshin. He mutters at her under his breath, then turns back to them. "Wife?"_

 _Lee Hyuk nods, looking slightly confused. "Yes. This is my wife, Lee Sun."_

 _"_ _Sunny!" she yelps. Lee Hyuk chuckles, and she smacks his shoulder. "It's Sunny!"_

 _"_ _The actress," Kim Shin says. Sunny's face lights up, flattered, and he can't help but smile at her obsession over her appearance. He stares her up and down; she's wearing a chic black pencil skirt and a loose tiger-print blouse. Her lips are dark red, and if at all possible her eyes have gotten bigger since her last lifetime, as though the gods made them bigger every time on purpose. He wants to call her his ugly sister, but he worries it will trigger memories of her past life, and so he bites his tongue._

 _Kim Shin glances up at Eun Tak's window; perhaps she'll move in with him, just not in his same room, before they are married if she does it to look after these two._

 _"_ _And you wish to rent my home?"_

 _Lee Hyuk nods, and Sunny's eyes widen hopefully._

 _"_ _For how long?"_

 _"_ _We can discuss time over contract," Sunny says, at the moment Lee Hyuk says, "20 months."_

 _Kim Shin chuckles at the glare Sunny shoots at her husband. The former Grim Reaper responds by landing a peck on her cheek; she immediately smiles and seems to forget and forgive all. Kim Shin doesn't remember ever seeing his sister change from a negative mood so rapidly._

 _He regards them for another moment before nodding. "All right, then. Talk to your agent and get the matter arranged; the passcode for the house is . . ." He pauses. He can't remember it anymore. "It doesn't matter for now. Move in when you're ready. Take any of the empty rooms and make yourselves at home."_

 _He brushes off Sunny's delight, and Lee Hyuk nods in appreciation. Kim Shin immediately slips away while Sunny excitedly chippers to Lee Hyuk, something about what a stylish house he'd found. Kim Shin grins at the clack of high heels against the sidewalk, fading quickly into the distance._

 _But he doesn't know the passcode, so no one can get inside until he figures it out. Perhaps Eun Tak will remember; he hasn't changed it. He hasn't wanted to. But now he will have company, and he will have Eun Tak back._

 _"_ _Dokkaebi!"_

 _He glances up at In-na and prevents a smile from coming to his face. He slows himself and nods to her. She grins at him, somewhat like Sunny but with a more commanding demeanor. He glances in In-na's carrier at Tae-shin, peacefully breathing. Kim Shin's brow furrows; he looks familiar._

 _"_ _I wish to marry your daughter," Kim Shin says, locking eyes with In-na again._

 _In-na waves him off. "I know, Dokkaebi. I'm sure she'll tell me all about it when I get home. I came home at midnight and she'd vanished, so I assumed you two were already married. Why aren't you?"_

 _"_ _Are you waiting on this?"_

 _In-na nods, impatient. "She didn't talk about anything but you growing up, as though she remembered everything from her past life." In-na does her best to conceal her smile, but Kim Shin knows her well enough to see right through her pretense. He did the same thing often, after all. He almost feels guilty for taking Ji Eun Tak away from In-na, but not enough to say he would let Eun Tak stay. He needs his bride, after all: not being able to die only pains him without her, even if the blade no longer troubles him._

 _He pauses at the thought of Eun Tak finally seeing the scar in his chest, the burning strip where the blade had once resided. She would not despise him for it, certainly, but he doesn't know what it means . . . what will happen to him. It can't be eroding away at him, for it doesn't sting unless he touches it. He might think it to be taking his powers, but it's been around since his return from that snowy wasteland; perhaps this issue has less to do with him and more with Ji Eun Tak._

 _But what could she possibly have done?_

 _He distantly bids In-na farewell, for Tae-shin had awakened and refused to calm down. In-na quickly trots into the apartment building and up to Eun Tak's room. He glances up, only to find Eun Tak watching him. His stare grows intent, wishing for the moment he can call her his own. He's always been made for her, and he feels it's some horrid twist of fate—some severe answer Deity gave him eighty years ago—that she is not at his home right now._

 _But eighty years . . . would she be dead by now if she had been allowed to live?_

 _His mind buzzes with questions he doesn't want to think about as he slips into his car and drives home. He'll have to get used to this, driving around instead of using doors. He sighs. Getting back to Canada will be difficult, as he'll need a passport, but thankfully Woo Bin will perhaps be capable of helping him in a few years._

 _Or earlier. Woo Bin is a smart boy, unlike his predecessor, although Duk Hwa died an honorable man as undoubtedly Chairman Yoo hoped he would._

 _Kim Shin does not smile at any of these memories; he reaches his home too soon, only to find a contractor outside. He barely allows the car to coast into his driveway, not ready to face any of this. He doesn't know why he accepted their desire to rent anymore, until he remembers perhaps it will make his bride happy . . . and he loves watching her face swell brightly with excitement. He grins at the thought, and all through the dull announcement of rent by the agent._

 _He almost thanks Duk Hwa in his mind for going through all this before, but he has no doubt his then-nephew's mind had been on money the entire time. So he cuts the agent off short, pays him what he asks for, and marches back up to the house._

 _He pauses at the keypad. He'd been able to get in last night before picking up Eun Tak, but now he finds himself at a loss._

 _"_ _Excuse me, sir," a young, solemn voice pipes up. "May I assist you?"_

 _Kim Shin turns back to Woo Bin. The boy's modest bicycle rests outside the driveway so as not to intrude on another's property—as his late mother taught him—and his expression is blank and demure._

 _"_ _Yes, nephew," Kim Shin says._

 _Woo Bin steps up to the keypad and punches in four digits; Kim Shin tries to follow it, and after peering at the keypad's pattern he realizes it's 1004. He remembers Duk Hwa saying it in a sudden, dismissed memory. He shakes his foolishness off and follows Woo Bin inside._

 _"_ _Is CEO Seo taking good care of you?" Kim Shin asks. Woo Bin looks more like his mother than like his fathers before him, and while there are no features of Kim Shin's first servants in his face, the Dokkaebi can't help but see the gentle, childlike loyalty of his young friend so many years ago._

 _Woo Bin nods respectfully. "Yes, my lord."_

 _"_ _Are you enjoying your studies?"_

 _A hint of a smile betrays Woo Bin's face before he lets it disappear. "I enjoy the literature, my lord."_

 _Kim Shin kneels before the boy and claps his shoulder. "Here. Come and read with me for a while. What book would you like?"_

 _The austere barrier on the boy's face crumbles, and his smile swells. "Yes, my lord! Anything you ask of me." And then he begins, at a steadily increasing pace, to expound on his favorite literature, English and Chinese works from hundreds of years before. He even mentions the Tale of Genji, which surprises Kim Shin; apparently the boy knows more languages and alphabets than most, as he mentions preferring the diction of the novel in Japanese to Hangul._

 _Kim Shin listens to the boy for a long time before he finally finds a book to read in Kim Shin's bedroom. Kim Shin doesn't read for a long moment, staring at the bright-eyed child. He knows he will enjoy the boy's company immensely, especially when Eun Tak dies for the second time._

 _His smile breaks down, and he buries himself in his book to avoid the thought. What about when she dies for the final time?_

 _He shudders._

 _"_ _My lord?" Woo Bin questions._

 _Kim Shin waves him off. "It's nothing," he says. "Keep reading; I will settle in a moment."_

 _But the thought doesn't even leave him in his dreams almost twelve hours later._


	9. A Fate of Blood

**Thanks to all those who have reviewed! I promise I will reply to your reviews next Saturday. :) I hope you like this chapter; we're roughly a fourth of the way through the story.**

 **Three Years Later**

"No! You can't cook an egg by folding it in half; you have to roll it!"

"Europeans call it an omelet," Lee Hyuk says coolly.

My eyes flicker open at the typical breakfast banter. My back has a line of sweat across it where Kim Shin's arm has rested for the last two or three hours; I know because I felt it move in the middle of the night.

I smile tiredly, ready to go out and face the other married couple outside. They are so sweet when they aren't finicky about food. Boss—Sunny, I remind myself—still knows more about chicken than anyone, and she calls Lee Hyuk her "lion" sometimes.

I anticipate breakfast with them; it means I never have to say anything, and Kim Shin listens to me when I do have something to say. So I shove up on the bed to get out of it, hoping to let my husband sleep, but his arm flexes initially around my shoulders and drags me back down.

"You're not going to breakfast already," he accuses, not remotely awake. "Why get up now? You don't have work today."

I laugh and push him off. "No, but breakfast is ready. I can hear Mr. Reaper outside."

He eyes me balefully. "You calling him Reaper is like me calling him 'His Majesty.' If you wanted me to move on so badly, why are you stuck in the past?"

"Because I don't blame him for anything," I reply cheerfully, still trying to worm my way off the bed. Kim Shin is insistent, however, and tangles my legs in the blankets with one hand while dragging me to him by the shoulders with the other. "Now I would like to go eat breakfast, Kim Shin."

"This is the only power I have left," he insists. "You have to stay."

I can't untangle myself, so I give up briefly. As I assumed, he relaxes when I do, and I push to roll out of the bed. He exhaustedly grabs my hand and keeps me inside.

"Eun Tak . . ."

"Wake up, Kim Shin," I tease. I brush his hair back, ruffled from a dreamful sleep. He gives me a wide-eyed stare and leans up to kiss me. I don't have time, but I let him invest in me for a short moment. When I kiss him, it's short, but because he started it, this one is longer. He shuffles up to me, and I lean over the side of the bed; if he lets go I'll fall. But I'm lost in the fleeting tenderness of his lips brushing against mine.

Finally Sunny knocks loudly on our door before the latch clicks open. Kim Shin panicks, breaking away from me.

"Honestly, Sun!" he protests. "You're married; you know not to—,"

"Come out for breakfast," she interrupts. "You're so disgusting."

Aside from Kim Shin's arm looped around my back, we're not touching at all. But he releases me, his expression exasperated. I chuckle, pecking at his cheek before I stand. I wince at the pang in my wrist, but it's been there for a few days; I'm sure it will go away. Chances are Kim Shin has been leaning on it in his sleep or something.

"But she's gone now," Kim Shin whispers.

"We can't run away," I retort, standing to straighten the bed. "Come on, _dangsin_. The sooner we eat the sooner we can go out together."

He casts his gaze to the ground before standing. "But I can't take you to Canada."

"We went last week, Kim Shin; it's all right," I coax. I know what he's getting at, what he's been getting at every day for nine years. "You have a passport. You don't need the doors anymore, and I don't need the doors either, as long as I have you."

He still looks broken, and I sigh. I don't know what to do with him . . . what to do _for_ him. I do still love him, and while it is harder for him without his powers, they weren't what I loved most about him.

Although I realize I haven't seen him doing as much good in the world lately. I can't either, for I cannot see ghosts. We mostly just stick to each other; I forget everyone else when I'm around him.

"Eun Tak?"

I glance back at Kim Shin, only to realize I've been pinching my wrist. I throw him off.

"It's all right. My arm is just hurting again," I say. Before he can tell me to sit down and calm my pain, I trot out the door. Lee Hyuk waves quietly to me before turning back to his eggs, and Sunny taps her foot impatiently.

"Where's Big Brother?" she persists.

"You still call him Big Brother?" I take my seat at the table, giving her a sincere smile. Kim Shin tells me Deity is selfish, but he can't be too selfish: Sunny still recognizes, in some part of her mind, her brother.

Sunny shrugs, a sassy glint in her eyes. "You call me 'Boss' sometimes." Before I can protest, she holds up a hand. "I've heard you say it many times, Eun Tak; did you once have a boss that looked like me? Or am I just bossy?" She cocks her hips and folds her arms, daring me to insult her. But I just smile; even if I do insult her, she will give me a typical response. Everything not flattering offends her on the same level.

"You would make a very lovely boss," I say, settling down at the table. I wince at the pinch in my wrist, and I don't catch Sunny's reaction to my statement. I try to envision the sparkle in her eye and the satisfied grin on her face—but it hurts too much. I roll my fingers up and down, and the ache subsides slightly to my movement.

"Good morning, Eun Tak," Lee Hyuk says when he steps in. I let out an initial "aw" when he leans down to peck Sunny's lips, and she gives him an accusatory—but self-satisfied—glance before turning to the table with plates of rolled eggs. Lee Hyuk offers me a folded egg, an "omelet" as he called it, before Sunny can catch him in the act.

Woo Bin comes to the table before Kim Shin does, and he bows to me politely. "Good morning, Mrs. Kim Eun Tak. Mr. Lee Hyuk. Mrs. Lee Sun."

Sunny and Lee Hyuk have already started another mild banter over whether steak is acceptable to eat with a little pink in the middle, and I turn back to Woo Bin with the only smile I can manage against the pain in my wrist. "Good morning, Mr. Yoo Woo Bin."

He waves me off as always; for a boy of only thirteen, he is incredibly insightful . . . and somehow can't stand Tae-shin. I notice Tae-shin looks more and more like Duk Hwa every day—and acts more like him in spite of his impoverished background—so perhaps that is why they don't get along.

"I am not deserving of a title yet, Mrs. Kim." He glances down at our bedroom door. "Is my lord awake yet?"

I nod. "Yes, and he should be coming out for breakfast any minute." I know he will deny my request, but I ask it anyway; I don't ask it every morning, but Woo Bin isn't in school right now, and I wish he would relax once in a while. "Why don't you sit down? You don't have to wait for Kim Shin."

He shakes his head and straightens his tie; he just got old enough to wear a suitcoat, and he never fails to have a clean one on hand. "I will seat my lord as my father would have had me do. Will Mrs. Ji In-na be joining us today?"

"She's decided to take Tae-shin to Busan to visit her sister," I say. I never met my aunt, but now Omma is rich enough to travel with Tae-shin; I decided not to go because of my pain, but I didn't tell my mother.

Woo Bin doesn't easily hide his smile; he didn't ask if we were going to look after Tae-shin today out of politeness and self-control. Since school ended, Tae-shin came to us when Omma went to work.

"I hope they have an enjoyable time," he says.

"Sit down and eat, Woo Bin!" Sunny chides, setting more dishes on the table. Lee Hyuk slides his arm around her to snag a bite of omelet with his finger, and she slaps him away. "Otherwise Lee Hyuk will eat it all."

Her husband gives her a cheeky smile before sitting.

A loud knock interrupts Woo Bin's response, and he marches dutifully to the door. I sit back in my chair, suddenly tired; I got enough sleep last night, and I don't understand why I feel so awful.

"Eun Tak, are you all right?" Sunny asks, her hand draped over her husband's shoulder. We will all wait for Kim Shin, I know, but I don't want them to wait. I want to have more time to eat with him.

So I wave it off, but Woo Bin marches back in the room, looking a little scared and confused. He knocks on Kim Shin's door and says a man in black is here to see the Dokkaebi.

I leap from my chair, afraid. When I get to the door, a Grim Reaper, one I recognize, holds his hat in his hand. It's crumpled from him twisting it around, and he has a black death notice pinched between strained fingers and tight tendons.

"Is anything wrong?" I ask.

He blinks at me, subtly shuffling the card behind his back before bowing. "Are you the Goblin's Bride?"

I nod. "What is it?"

He swallows, and his already pale face grows ash-white. Kim Shin lowers his hand on my shoulder, pushing me back.

"Go to breakfast, Eun Tak," Kim Shin says. His voice is low, almost so I cannot hear it. His eyes shift to contact with mine, and I nod before stepping away.

But I don't go back to the table, not yet. I step behind a nearby column, listening, although I probably shouldn't be.

"It's for Ji Min-hee," the Reaper murmurs, his voice trembling. I hear a snatch of paper. "Progressed hereditary anemia and strained heart disease."

I immediately think of my father. I wander back to the table in shock; why would Deity send me back here just so I could die of a genetic disorder? Did I make this mistake, asking to be born to a Ji family? Would nothing else in Seoul be available to me?

Woo Bin asks if I'm all right, if he can get me something, when I slide into my chair. The wood before me grows queasy, and I can't focus. I blink the growing cloud away from my eyes, but it doesn't disappear; sweat beads at my skin.

Last time I chose my death.

Now my death is happening inside of me . . . something I cannot choose.

But my life is perfect. I can't leave it yet; I'm supposed to stay with my Ajhussi, my Dokkaebi, for a long time.

Voices yell my name in a loud blur as my concentration fades away. The ache in my wrist becomes a full-blown snap, sending a shockwave through my entire arm; I feel it travel right to my heart, as though time slows to let me feel my end.

"Ji Eun Tak!" Kim Shin yells.

My head lolls toward the floor, and I know nothing more.


	10. The Clock

**To Mustang's Inferno, RC, Diem Kieu, opheliablack, and marie david: Thanks so much for the reviews! :D All your questions will be answered soon, I'm sure (although we're only 1/4 of the way through the story). I hope this chapter gives you something to look forward to next Saturday, when I promise I will update. :)**

 **A/N: "Sin" is Korean for "god," and I use that for the name of the primary deity in this story that inhabited Duk Hwa in the original series. And this chapter starts back a few seconds from where the last one left off, just to give a little background on what Kim Shin sees that Eun Tak missed. Anyway, please review and be sure to read the chapter next week! :)**

 _"_ _It's for Ji Min-hee," the Reaper says. The Dokkaebi doesn't even question whether the Reaper respects him; he doesn't care right now. He snatches the death announcement away, but he still can't read it. He turns it in the light, daring it to tell him she will die. "Progressed hereditary anemia and heart disease."_

 _Kim Shin swears under his breath and hands back the certificate. "I'll take her to the hospital, then."_

 _"_ _She'll die at 4:15 this afternoon if you do not hurry," the Grim Reaper warns._

 _He nods and turns, then hears yelling from the kitchen. The Reaper immediately steps away from the porch, but Kim Shin does not heed him. Sunny's voice is strained; Woo Bin is afraid. They're yelling out her name, the name of his bride, the name he has loved for over almost a century and dreaded to hear echoed in death yet again._

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak!" he cries, racing into the kitchen. Her head nearly hits the floor before he slides on his knees, catching her in his lap. He lowers her from the chair and leaps to his feet._

 _"_ _Big Brother, what's going on?!" Sunny demands._

 _Kim Shin doesn't answer. He runs out the door with Eun Tak in his arms, his pulse quickened against her dying one; he won't lose her again. No._ Sin _can't do this to him; fate would never be so cruel, this has to be an act of trickery._

 _He gently lays her in the backseat of his white van and leaps into the front, swerving out of his driveway almost fast enough to roll the vehicle. He slams his foot into the gas pedal, unable to keep up with his adrenaline, even in a car. He curses and wishes under his breath a thousand times, weaving through traffic—if he had his powers he would stop time and have her out of harm's way with no trouble at all. With his powers he could have just taken her through a door and immediately appeared at the hospital._

 _With his powers there wouldn't be people honking and yelling at him as he forges his way through the busy streets._

 _Not quickly enough, he arrives at the hospital, throws the door open without bothering to close it again, and races inside with Eun Tak. He cries out for an open emergency room._

 _The doctors eye him warily and angrily, when finally a young woman with lighter, reddish hair and large eyes stops him._

 _"_ _What is it, sir?"_

 _"_ _Blood cancer," he says. "Please, do something for her!"_

 _"_ _Doctor Kang, a table just opened upstairs," an older, black-haired man blurts. "We can take her up there."_

 _They force Kim Shin to remain behind while they rush her upstairs. He tries to follow, but other doctors grab his arms and hold him back. He yanks against them, watching his wife's limp body hurried away, losing life and blood faster than he can process it._

 _"_ _Eun Tak!" His cry emerges weak, and they sit him down in the waiting room. He shakes his head over and over; at least the Grim Reaper hasn't come for her yet._

 _"_ _It will be all right, sir," the doctors reassure him. They bring him water, food, but he refuses to touch it. They blur by, faces of ignorant sympathy and a lack of concern where it should be, focused on his dying bride. His feet launch him from his chair, searching for peace in pacing with no respite . . . as though walking will help. It stilled the pain so many decades ago, but it can't cut off the realization that his paradise of the last three years is suddenly going fading away in a hotel room he can't even access._

 _The clock ticks, seemingly faster and faster: she's been gone for thirty minutes. An hour. Doctors come back confirming her diagnosis, and a new shipment of treatment is arriving presently. Three hours. More hysterical families rush their bleeding patients into the hospital. Five. Sunny and Lee Hyuk eventually find their way to the hospital and wait with him. Seven hours._

 _Then he realizes it's 4:00._

 _He makes a break for the doors he saw her disappear to. Cries of protest follow him, hands reach to take him back. He evades them, watching the clocks embedded in the blank hospital walls as they tick effortlessly on, as though time isn't killing or breaking anyone. He shoves through an endless sea of faces and bodies, unwilling to let this happen again. He will save her this time, he's sure._

 _Five minutes; he doesn't know where she's gone. Ten minutes; he races by a staircase._

 _He remembers she is "upstairs" somewhere, and he catapults himself one stair up after another. Doctors protest, but they have patients to look after: someone else will stop him, if he guesses their thoughts correctly. His gaze flickers from one doctor to another. Three minutes—he finally locates Doctor Kang. He bolts to her side and grabs her arm. She looks sympathetic._

 _"_ _I'm sorry, sir," she said. "The treatment was too late, and her heart is failing. The blood transfusions won't work. There's nothing we—,"_

 _He doesn't wait for the rest. 4:14, the clock teases. "Where is she?!"_

 _Doctor Kang glances over her shoulder, and Kim Shin leaps into the adjoining white room. Doctors mop up blood from Eun Tak's side; her face is paler than a bowl of rice. She weakly attempts a smile, then grimaces in pain._

 _He crashes to his knees by her side. "Ji Eun Tak!" He bites his lip, straining not to cry: he can't let this happen again. It won't._

 _The Grim Reaper is already here, but hesitantly waiting. Above him, a clock hits the thirty-second mark; he has thirty seconds left with the love of his life before he loses her for more time than he can stand._

 _Time. His whole life has been time, time wasted, time spent looking for a creature_ Sin _couldn't stop taking from him; time he spent in pain, time he spent wishing for her to come back._

 _"_ _Eun Tak . . ." His voice settles into a hoarse plea. His fingers grip hers, willing the life to return to them._

 _"_ _Sarangheo," Eun Tak manages. "I'm sorry I couldn't have stayed longer."_

 _Ten seconds—her eyes drift closed, and her breathing shallows._

 _"_ _Eun Tak!"_

 _Three seconds. Her hand drops from his, and the Grim Reaper steps forward._

 _"_ Sin _, please let me save her!"_

 _The clock freezes, with two seconds left._


	11. God of Sorrow and Miracles

**And here it is! Thanks for the reviews: Mustang's Inferno and marie david! :) I appreciate them a lot, and they keep me going in writing. :D**

 _Kim Shin's labored breathing fills the frozen moment; he stares at the clock, certain it has stopped working, but the Grim Reaper doesn't move. Eun Tak's eyes halt mid-blink, and no doctors move outside._

 _"_ _This is the first time you have ever prayed. You must indeed be desperate."_

 _Kim Shin whips around and finds an athletic young doctor with sweeping hair and poignant eyes. The doctor sets down his clipboard and approaches; the echoes of butterfly wings sweep the silence._

 _"_ _Even with your powers you wouldn't be able to save the Goblin's Bride. She is immune to your abilities, you recall."_

 _"_ _You!" Kim Shin stands. "What are you doing here?!"_

 _"_ _You prayed me here, Dokkaebi,"_ Sin _answers. He glances at Eun Tak. "I have stopped time because your request will have lasting consequences, and you need to know them if you want her to live. You are also, I'm sure, curious as to what happened to your powers."_

 _Kim Shin's eyes darken. He wishes a storm would stir outside and the world could know how bitterness roiled inside of him, how he had all the power in the world until this god decreed it otherwise, this god that made him a Dokkaebi in the first place. "What will you do? Do you give me this hope only to have it snatched away?"_

 _"_ _Patience, Kim Shin."_

 _"_ _You took my powers! I know you did!" He rushes to grab_ Sin's _collar, but the god sidesteps him. He moves to the head of Eun Tak's bed._

 _"_ _And I will restore them if you listen."_

 _Kim Shin turns, stoic. He can't help but be interested now._

 _"_ _You were given this bride as a token of escape, as a part of your curse: only when you grew to love her could she remove the sword. But you were meant to rest in peace, not live as a Dokkaebi with no ability to move on. But you continued to help those around you, and so I allowed you to stay. But when she came back, I knew your powers would only focus on pleasing her. Thus I took them from you, and I took her powers from her as well: if you did not notice, she can no longer summon you. If you die, she cannot bring you back."_

 _"_ _But I cannot die, as you said."_

 _"_ _Not unless I decree it so."_

 _Kim Shin quiets. "So I must continue to better the lives of those around me, and I will have my powers back."_

 _"_ _No."_ Sin's _eyebrows narrow. "You will not focus anywhere but her so long as you have money and abilities sufficient. You have become a failure as a god, and I now see it would be foolish to let you continue this way."_

 _"_ _Why would you make Eun Tak suffer? She did nothing."_

 _"_ _Her destiny is not only for you. Her focus has turned to only you as well, and I had to put an end to it. I will have her born on the other side of the country if she dies, and you will never find her. Your punishment for your selfishness will to be alone once again."_

 _Kim Shin's pride swells, but he cuts it off and falls to one knee. He knows he has been beaten; he cannot control life and death now. "Please let me save her. I do not know what you want, but I love her. Do not take her from me."_

 _"_ _I will allow you to save her. Not only that, I will grant her immortality,"_ Sin _says. "On a single condition."_

 _He gives Kim Shin a moment to consider, and then the Dokkaebi nods._

 _"_ _Fate is the question I have asked you, and you have presented an insufficient answer: you are here to serve, not to be focused on what can benefit you alone. She is here to do the same. It is not that either of you live, but that the two of you are together. This is where the conflict lies. You asked if you could go to her with the rain, with the first snow; I will let you see her on the day of the first snow, and I will let you speak to her and let her hear your voice on days of rain. But you must become a god. Your time as a Dokkaebi is finished—there is no more Goblin's Bride, either. Become a true god; join us in the heavenly realm, and she will live forever, able to see you once a year."_

 _Kim Shin pales, staring at his dying bride. He can't imagine being forced to watch her from a distance, only able to hold her in memories and feel her presence drift alone in this world._

 _"_ _And if I do not become a god?"_

 _"_ _You are trapped forever, Kim Shin,"_ Sin _warns. "You have no way to die, and you have nothing to live for. You will create limbo for yourself, surrounded by mortals. Eun Tak will never be a part of your life again, and she may move on to marry another in one of her future lifetimes."_

 _Kim Shin inhales sharply._

 _"_ _Make your decision quickly."_ Sin _points at the clock, and the hands strain to shift. "You have two seconds when I depart. Should you choose to become a god, the power to save her life and maintain it will be in your hands. You will become the god of miracles and wealth, serving those that require it."_

 _Before Kim Shin can protest, the ticking of the second hand screams in his ear. He doesn't even consider the logic of his decision; he immediately stretches out his hand to Eun Tak, concern for her life overpowering every other emotion within him, and powers he has never known flood his bloodstream. His skin burns with energy, erasing the scar on his chest and all the agony of the deaths he has witnessed from his time as a Dokkaebi. An agonized cry rips from his mouth—he buckles against her bed._

 _"_ _Kim Shin?" she whispers._

 _He glances up, sweat trickling down his forehead. Color returns to her face, and her brilliant features twist with concern. "Kim Shin, what's wrong?"_

 _The Grim Reaper's eyes widen, and he stares at the former Dokkaebi. "She is alive," the Grim Reaper whispers._

Sin _steps out from the shadows. "Kim Shin is coming with me, Eun Tak. His fate is to help the living; I'm afraid he cannot be with you any longer."_

 _Eun Tak's eyes widen. "No!"_

 _"_ _I will come with the first snow," Kim Shin promises, but his voice even sounds weak to him. "It will not be as though I am dead, I promise; I will be there. I will hold you, I will talk to you."_

 _Eun Tak leaps from her bed, and her IV collapses to the floor. She grabs him hard, her fists bunched in the back of his shirt. Her heartbeat wildly bangs against his own. "You can't leave me again! You can't go! Let me die if you must!"_

 _"_ _We would be parted either way." Kim Shin braces her shoulders and pulls her away from him. Out of the corner of his eye, he watches the Grim Reaper depart._ Sin _politely turns his back, focused on the hospital outside. No doctors come in, but the clock is ticking on as normal now._

 _He traces Eun Tak's hair from her face. Blood rushes to her eyes, and tears pool above her lashes; they do not fall yet. She is pained, but not weak. "I will miss you. I will always love you, but this is the only way to let our desires be a part of fate. Be strong, my Goblin's Bride." He feels the sting of tears as well; his fall faster than hers. She immediately brushes them away._

 _Her arms lock around his neck; her face buries in his shoulder, shuffling and digging for a way out of this. "Please, no. I can't live without you. He can't make me forget you again."_

 _"_ _You won't forget me," Kim Shin assures._

Sin _steps right up to them, and Kim Shin almost anticipates him to bend down and push them apart. "Come, Kim Shin. It is time."_

 _Eun Tak desperately gropes for his sleeve, but_ Sin _does not step way. She finally relaxes, giving up, and timidly brushes her mouth against Kim Shin's. He takes the opportunity: this is the last time he will kiss her until the first snow, whenever it will be: he was not made god of the weather._

 _Pleasure and anguish blend a storm in his mind as he holds her closer, letting this be their last contact. He releases her at last; he feels she is too weak for him to let go, but_ Sin _gives him a solemn look. They cannot stay._

 _He stands and turns away. He can't even look back at her, afraid he will change his mind and regret what he cannot alter._ Sin _follows him out the door; as he feared, he hears the rustle of her sheets and her feet hitting the floor, but a dozen doctors rush in to see the miracle that has just taken place in a patient at the brink of death. Her protests ring softly in the air, unable to penetrate the exclamations surrounding her._

 _Doctor Kang rushes past Kim Shin with Sunny, Lee Hyuk, and Woo Bin close behind. They do not give him a second glance._

 _"_ _Gods are not always visible,"_ Sin _says. "And I cannot let them see you. They will remember a story other than this one; those two will consider you dead, but Eun Tak will not."_

 _"_ _How could you do this to her?" Kim Shin snaps back. He halts, but_ Sin _keeps walking. "She is now without a husband, a home, a family, a purpose."_

 _"_ _She still works at the job she has always dreamed of,"_ Sin _says, unrepentant. "She has your home to live in, a rather lavish one. She will look after Woo Bin, perhaps become a great leader of your company. And you will still see her often enough; as an immortal, once a year should be rather frequent for you."_

 _Kim Shin bites his tongue and follows._ Sin _leads him to the door of the hospital._

 _"_ _Meet me in heaven, Kim Shin,"_ Sin _orders. A white butterfly appears behind the handsome doctor, then floats out the door. The doctor blinks the influence of_ Sin _away, staring Kim Shin up and down._

 _"_ _Can I help you, sir?"_

 _Kim Shin shakes his head, then pauses: he can see not only this man's life at the present, but he senses every reincarnation, where this man has come from and where he is heading: this man barely made it as a doctor. He is not as smart as the education system requires; his wife of two incarnations out of three died six months before, and he has three children to look after. Kim Shin's mind floods as he watches all the little details in a matter of seconds._

 _"_ _But I can help you," Kim Shin says. He glances behind him, wishing Eun Tak could be here, but he will always be a strong Dokkaebi that faces his fate head-on—even_ Sin _can't take away his identity. He offers a hand. "Come; you could use a sandwich."_


	12. Powers of Rain

**Sorry this took so long to upload . . . I've just have been thinking more about writing than uploading lately. :D Thankfully that means there's about ten chapters more of material than what's published, so hopefully it should be easier to publish from here on in. Thanks for your continued support, and enjoy the story! And a huge thank you to Queen Hady, marie david, and RC for reviewing! :)**  
Omma comes home almost immediately; apparently Sunny called her to explain my illness. Somehow none of them ask about Kim Shin during the day. None of the doctors remember him, and even Woo Bin seems at peace, if not sympathetic, regarding my Dokkaebi.

The hospital lets me go. I see Kim Shin's van in the parking lot, its door wide open; Sunny hands me the keys and asks if I'll be all right driving home.

I bring Woo Bin to my side. "Of course, Sunny," I say, but it's all I can do not to choke. "I'll wait for Omma. I'm sure she's worried, and she's probably already on her way to the hospital."

"She's actually still at her home," Sunny says. "Lee Hyuk told her to stay there. But if you can drive home, go ahead; we'll be there." She turns and flounces away without another word. I smile weakly: at least she still cares about me, even if she doesn't have the most caring way of showing it sometimes.

Woo Bin opens the driver door for me, and I slip inside. The key slacks in my hand as I stare at the wheel; I wish I had been able to follow Kim Shin, find out where they took him, who took him and where they got the authority to separate my husband from me.

I settle into a broken stupor. I drive to my omma's home; she embraces me and asks if I feel all right. She doesn't ask about Kim Shin, as though it is not strange for him to have left my side. I shrug off her concern, still in shock and trying to recall what had just happened. Her words blur by, and she embraces Woo Bin. Duk Hwa enters the room—no, not Duk Hwa: Tae-shin.

They're too much alike. He asks why I look so terrible before Omma snaps. "Watch your tongue and be respectful," she chides.

But I couldn't care less; I know my brother, and at the moment I don't feel I am here in my own mother's apartment. I take Woo Bin and leave quickly enough.

"Mrs. Eun Tak," Woo Bin says while we drive. I snap out of my visions, these flashes I'm having, the last moments I will be with Kim Shin as far as I can know. "Are you all right? Are you thinking of my lord again?"

I bite my lip. "Yes, Woo Bin. Tell me again, what happened."

"I do not know," Woo Bin confesses hesitantly. "I only know you came back from the hospital without him; you've never told me what happened."

I swallow. "The gods took him away." I glance out the window, unable to let Woo Bin see my eyes flooding with tears as they are. "And it was my fault."

The car is silent as we pull up to the main home, the home I've driven to after work every day . . . the door opened for me by Woo Bin, only for Kim Shin to come barreling out the front, raise me up in his arms, and kiss me until even the solemn Woo Bin had to look away. I chuckle, and a sniffle follows.

"Mrs. Eun Tak?"

I wave Woo Bin inside. "Thank you. But you should go inside now; I'll be there in a few minutes."

He gives me a sympathetic look before bowing and turning inside. The door shuts behind him, and the pain in my heart opens. Before I can even think, tears flood my face, and I can't stop my rapid breathing. Not only is Kim Shin gone for a time I can't begin to estimate, but I feel different: my breathing is different. It's as though the aging in my body I never even noticed before has come to a halt. I don't know what's happening to me; my memories are stark, and I can't drive them away.

As though I've been cursed myself.

It must be my fault, I realize; I must be the reason I'm like this, the reason Kim Shin lost his powers, the reason they took him away. I had no explanation. I don't know where he is, what he's doing.

I drag myself out of the car after some time, time I don't care to measure. The day whirs by; the gentle people surrounding me keep an eye on me, but they cannot help. They cannot change what I feel; they cannot bring Kim Shin back. I know I told him to move on when I died, but this is different: I planned to come back. I planned to see him in heaven by some miracle after my last lifetime drew to a close.

Apparently we were never meant to live normal lives for long, a Dokkaebi and his bride. But someday, somehow, the gods would have to let us be together. Someday I would not be alive anymore. Someday I could ask Kim Shin all my questions, remain in his arms as long as he could possibly want me.

 _Kim Shin has never been to heaven before, but it isn't hard to find; the Grim Reaper seems to understand what he is going through, and he lets him in through the lion-knocker door, up those stairs Kim Shin has only ever seen from a distance. He begins the climb up them, taking it slowly as though_ Sin _can come back out and change his mind, send him home to his Eun Tak._

 _The stairs extend for what seems to be an eternity, but when he begins climbing them faster he slowly comes upon a layer of clouds, and when he passes through them he emerges in a new world entirely, a different Earth, an immortal realm. There are no gates to the city before him, for the stairs are only open to those who have created a heaven worthy of them._

 _The city does not look unusual by any means, and when he peers through the streets he can see other cities in the distance. But as he cuts a straight path to a tall, white skyscraper in the midst of the city, he is greeted kindly by every face he sees. They are all happy; they have all forged their own happiness. He can only hope his Sun makes it here._

 _Eun Tak never will. She is immortal; they will not let her come here._

 _His face falls, and he speaks to no one. He does not feel he belongs here; he has never belonged. Even though his status has been altered, he is still a Dokkaebi. He still bears the weight of being a Goblin once and for the rest of his being._

 _He enters the skyscraper, much to the surprise of a handful of passing onlookers; he's sure only gods enter this building, as it looks lavish enough to please_ Sin. _He snorts—it's even lavish enough to please Kim Shin. The tall triangular prism is touched with gold trim on the exterior, and it appears to be made of limestone. The doors are massive mahogany with golden knobs in the shape of the character "Heaven."_

 _Kim Shin presses onward, keeping his gaze away from the towering marble pillars and massive, golden hallways of the interior. White doors with names and stations in elaborate golden calligraphy line the halls—some of these people oversee the Grim Reapers, and others are gods sent to Earth at one time or another. He finds Samshin's name a few floors up, and knows_ Sin _must be at the top._

 _"_ _Kim Shin."_

 _He whirls around, only to see a young man with soft eyes and a brilliant smile. He wears the shirt of a soldier; with his powers back, Kim Shin can see he recently finished his last life in war. His wife is the doctor at the hospital, also on her fourth life, but mourning and troubled without him._

 _Kim Shin already knows his next assignment._

 _"_ _If you will follow me, please," the young man says, turning. "_ Sin _has asked that you be set up on this floor. You will report back here once every month; this is simply to keep unruly gods from remaining deities inside the Sacred Pillar."_

 _Kim Shin resists another snort as he follows the young man—Yoo Shi Jin, he notices after scoping the man's background a little longer. Apparently he is so honorable he has been allowed to work in the Pillar, for he is not a god._

 _Shi Jin gestures to one of the many red doors with Kim Shin's name printed across the top, as well as the label "God of Miracles and Wealth."_

 _Kim Shin enters the room and thanks Shi Jin, only because he feels the pain of being separated from the one he loves. But he still shuts the door in Shi Jin's face; the young man will have his wife join him in forty or fifty years. Kim Shin will still be wishing after his for far longer. If only Eun Tak could die . . . but she would still have to go through two lifetimes, and would probably still meet another man of some kind._

 _The room Kim Shin enters has a wider expanse than the spacing of the doors would permit, but the rules of space are altered here. White couches and gold-vein tile catch his eye first, followed by a myriad of old-style paintings framed in gold. When he crosses the main threshold over to a bedroom, he finds his entire wardrobe inside. He catches the candle scent of home and slams the door to the bedroom, unable to take it anymore._

 _He turns back to the main door, only to find_ Sin _standing there. Even now the god is cloaked in shadows, and Kim Shin gets no look at his face;_ Sin _is backed into the corner, the only thing making him distinct the graceful butterfly patterns across his white, silk robe._

 _"_ _If there is ever a time Eun Tak does not live at your home, you are welcome to reside there as you work on Earth,"_ Sin _says. "Some of us have homes down there for a decent stretch of time. And if you attempt to visit her on any day excepting that of the first snow in Seoul, she will only catch glimpses of you, and you will regret the pain you cause her."_

 _Kim Shin pauses; she can still see him in flashes. He debates his options for a moment, but says nothing. He nods._

 _"_ _That is all,"_ Sin _says before fading out of sight, back into the shadows. The flapping of butterfly wings follows him._

 _Kim Shin marches to the door and opens it. He peers down both hallways before continuing. He can't keep his pace slow, not with all the considerations that he can see Eun Tak again, even if they can't yet interact. She'll be able to see him, and he'll be able to watch her from a distance—it will be enough._

 _"_ _The next time I see a white butterfly," he mutters, "I'm feeding it to a spider."_

 _All of his sarcasm flies away when he opens the Pillar door and walks straight into the PD office. He can only hope there is someone he can help around Eun Tak, perhaps to comfort her from a distance. It is, after all, still summer, thankfully close to the end of it._

 _He doesn't see her there, but he does manage to assist a few heartbroken and confused people. His thoughts continue to wander to her, and when he finally leaves the PD office for good—after leaving a few times for Subway—he walks straight into his own home._

 _He and the Grim Reaper have broken rules before. He's not afraid to try it again, especially after_ Sin _essentially stated that he expected Kim Shin to try and break them._

 _With his powers back, everything in his house is brighter and more stable. But he feels something very different when he walks in, as he had coming home over a hundred years ago to find another immortal in his home. Yes, that's what it is: the presence of another eternal being._

 _He doesn't hear Woo Bin anywhere. When he peers outside, Sunny's van is gone, and Lee Hyuk is nowhere to be seen._

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak?" he calls out softly._

 _The upstairs bedroom door flies open. Her eyes are red and puffy; she's gripping a vacuum, still working even though she's recovering from heartbreak. A sad smile flickers over the former Dokkaebi's face._

 _"_ _Kim Shin?" she whispers. She looks right past him; her gaze turns over the entire front room, and tears begin to trickle out of her eyes. "Kim Shin, come home. Please."_

 _Kim Shin dodges a lump in his throat, but it comes right back. His lungs squeeze, guilty and begging fate to set him free. He's been trapped before, but never like this. He's had years where he has not known where to find his bride; he's had years where he hasn't seen her face, months where he stayed trapped out of her life while she struggled to remember him. But now she's looking right at him and can't see him._

 _And he can't even try to date her. He knows who she is; he knows where she is; she remembers him. But he can do nothing._

 _He drags himself to the stairs and up them, the toes of his shoes catching against the step ridges. Eun Tak's expression falls to the floor; he reaches up to catch her jaw, to let her know that he is here, but as though told his intentions, she looks up ahead of his finger, through his face. She abruptly turns around. He reaches for her, but he can't catch her before she begins vacuuming again._

 _Kim Shin stares after her before he considers_ Sin's _warning again; he's going to have to take this as a lifestyle. As he wanders back down the stairs, his pride trickles away, replaced by defeat. He'll have to be content with seeing her on the days of the first snow._

 _Thunder rumbles mournfully in the distance; the patter of rain echoes her soft sobbing._

 _Kim Shin turns to the door, anguish marking his every step. He walks out of the door, straight into Quebec where he cannot feel the pain anymore, where the rain of his sorrow will not trouble him and he will not see his bride failing to move on._

 _Even as a god, even with all his abilities returned and infinite possibilities ahead of him, he has never felt so powerless before._


	13. The First Snow (Cheotnun)

**Queen Hady: Welcome, and thanks for joining! :D I'm glad you like it, and I hope the ending is good for you.**

 **Mustang's Inferno: Thank you! X) Sadistic as it may sound, I hope there are more feels later on for you!**

After imagining I saw Kim Shin in the living room, the rain is too much. His voice echoes on the air, whispering my name, telling me he loves me, telling me how much he hurts. I buckle to the floor; I can't take it.

"Please! You cannot abandon me like this!" I drop my housework for the moment and vault myself down the stairs. He has only been gone for a day, but I still can't manage it. Perhaps the pain will heal a little—however I know the scars will never fade. They couldn't even fade when I didn't remember him, after nine years.

The days blur by. Woo Bin and Tae-shin grow almost side by side, especially as Omma continues to work and Lee Hyuk and Sunny decide to move out; Sunny's been found pregnant, and they decide not to blend my burdens with theirs. I end up driving Woo Bin and Tae-shin to school together; every selfish or nearsighted comment out of my brother's mouth sends Woo Bin almost over the edge. They are many years apart, as Woo Bin is almost twelve and Tae-shin is barely four.

Aside from Tae-shin's taunting and Woo Bin's smart retorts (too smart for Tae-shin to even understand, or be offended at), my life is incredibly quiet. On days of rain I can hear Kim Shin's voice echoing through the big, empty house. It hasn't been long, so my eyes sting every time I hear it. Usually he tells me he feels alone, that no one will speak to him for long; as a god, he must hide.

Today is different.

I'm polishing the silver again, because Woo Bin will do it if I don't. I'm only a few forks into the massive pile of silver; we don't even use it, so I'm not sure why Woo Bin is so picky, why a child should even care. But he insists it is in memory of his master. Even though _Sin_ has deceived Woo Bin as well as the others, I somehow keep the tears at bay, perhaps to keep them in ignorance that Kim Shin was torn away from us because of whatever folly I committed.

I set my completed fork aside in the pile of finished ones only to grab another. But as I begin polishing it, I watch. Fleetingly, the flicker of candlelight scatters across the fork, as well as my necklace, shining a blend of gold and silver into my eyes. There's a draft in the house.

It's not raining, but I hear his voice.

 _"_ _Ji Eun Tak."_

The fork clatters to the floor. I run to the front door, only to find that there are clouds in the sky. I leap outside, waiting for the rain to collapse and for his voice—all I have left of him—to fill the air. The concrete shocks my feet with the ice cold.

 _"_ _Summon me. Blow out a candle, Eun Tak."_

I race back inside, not bothering to shut the door behind me. I snatch a candle from above the abandoned pile of silver. I decide to exercise more caution, as it could blow itself out and rid me of this precious chance. Not that I couldn't pick up another candle, but I can't wait for this to work. My pulse beats powerfully and painfully against my skin.

When I arrive at the door again, a single snowflake lights onto the porch, fading into a dark splotch almost immediately. I gape up at the clouds in spite of myself; snowflakes begin trailing down in flurries after the first.

Before the next flakes hit the ground, I blow hard on the candle. A snowflake wisps towards me from outside, sizzling against the quieted wick. The smoke expands into the freezing air, only to vanish. I watch it ascend . . . and then a dark shape enters the corner of my vision.

My Dokkaebi brings himself, a black figure in the white flurry of falling snow, up the porch and right to me. He stops below the indoor step, so he's a little shorter than I am by comparison.

He looks so real. I want to believe I can touch him.

". . . Kim Shin?"

His smile flickers up before settling again. "Ji Eun Tak."

My fingers tremble as I reach for his face. I suck in a sharp breath when his warm cheek tingles against my frozen hand; my palm flattens out against his face, but it does not stay. I let my hand travel down his shoulder, over his chest, just to make sure he's really here, that this isn't some cruel imagining. I've done this before, tricked myself into believing he came home. Maybe I'm forging the snow and his presence in my own mind.

His gaze flickers over mine, and he leans forward suddenly. The door nudges me towards him as well; I don't bother to consider whether he or the wind pushed it. He pulls me down towards him, and his mouth catches mine. I stifle a gasp at the stark, unexpected contact: I haven't felt this since he left, certainly, and dreams cannot do reality justice, no matter how much they convince me that they are true.

Kim Shin's head tilts one way, and then the other, his warm lips releasing me and bringing be back in gentle patterns. When he finally lets go, snow powders the back of him, but I don't care: I wrap my arms solidly around him and press my face into his shoulder to cut off my tears threatening to fall.

"You came back!" I exclaim, unsure what else I can say. He knows I love him; he knows I'm happy to see him. But I'm so surprised, I can't even tell myself how happy I am.

His stronger arms squeeze me close to him. "I told you I would come at the first snow," he says. " _Sin_ told me I could."

I break away from him. "What happened? Where have you been? How have you been? Are you home for good?"

Kim Shin's smile falters, and he glances up at the sky. "Only until tomorrow morning; I will be there when you fall asleep, but I shall probably be gone before you awaken." He lowers his arm to catch my knees, and he lifts me off the ground. I let out a shocked chuckle before his lips melt against mine again, and I'm rendered helpless. The door opens for him, and he steps inside. "But there is much to say, and much to be done."

Apparently he eats well in heaven, because even when I offer to make steak he says he's not hungry, that he would rather sit here with me on our couch in the front room. More he would rather sit on the couch and have me sit on his lap, which I do. My head rests against his shoulder and I feel his voice ripple through his neck as he speaks, almost losing track of what the words mean as they touch me directly.

"You and I are to be separated for eternity, then," I murmur. "Finished with my first lifetime and I still have a harsh fate; is there any peace? Is _Sin_ really as selfish as that? Or is he punishing me?"

"He is punishing _me_ ," Kim Shin says. "Again. You will live forever, and he said you will do a great deal of good." He pulls his head away from mine and tips my head up to face him. He has a smile in spite of the moment. "You already have done so much good, even though you can't see ghosts. I watch you all the time. I see what you do for your mother, for Woo Bin, for my ugly sister."

"Seriously!" I smack his shoulder. "You can't call her ugly; she's beautiful! And soon her stomach will be huge; she won't take a comment like that very kindly."

Kim Shin chuckles bitterly. "She doesn't know I'm alive. She doesn't have to know." Then his expression falls. "I can watch you whenever I wish. I come here sometimes, but _Sin_ has decreed it so that you cannot see me on days when it is not the first snow."

My eyebrows draw together. "So you have been here?"

He nods. "Sometimes I talk to you. Sometimes I talk to you from a distance, on the days when rain carries petitions."

"So I'm not going crazy."

He laughs outright. "No, you're not going crazy. Some nights I'm in bed as well; I know you've had dreams about it."

A sting pricks my eyes. "I do."

We talk for the remainder of the day. It feels like life has become joyful again; I'm not waiting hopelessly for something, and I don't feel an absence in my heart with nothing to fill it. But as he is here, it's easier for me to tell myself that I can wait until the next first snow: I have to be able to move on as I told him to do. I have to live my life to the fullest even without him.

Just not for now.

For now he's in my arms again. For now we have become a single entity, a Goblin and his bride, inseparable as fate dictated the moment _Sin_ made him a Dokkaebi.

I try to stay awake all night so he won't leave. He murmurs in my ear from time to time, memories and sentiments I beg never to go away.

"I don't want you to leave again," I finally blurt. My eyes blur as I grab my phone and check the time: it's almost 3:30. I've stayed awake this long; I have to keep going. I feared he would disappear at midnight, like in a story of some kind, but he's still here. I know he's still here.

Kim Shin smiles through his sleep. "I haven't left yet," he mutters. "I would tell you not to make this a sob story, because I don't want to be a part of one."

I wait for him to explain himself, but he doesn't yet. I prop myself up on an elbow expectantly, only for exhaustion to overtake me. I flop back onto the bed, barely able to keep my eyes open. How can he sleep at a time like this? "So why don't you tell me not to make this a sob story?"

The corner of his mouth twitches in the light of my phone. I hold it up high so I can see his face illuminated; he can't possibly be bothered that I'm looking at him. But he fumbles for my wrist, refusing to open his eyes, and lowers my arm to the bed. He pries the phone from my loose fingers and wraps his arms around me.

"Because I know I have no choice." His face shuffles into my shoulder. "But perhaps you won't make it a sob story if you take your own advice."

My eyebrows crease together.

"Don't be sad for too long," Kim Shin whispers, growing more exhausted. "Be grateful for the life and love you have received." His fingers twist softly into my hair. "But we'll see each other often enough. As an immortal you'll get used to it."

A massive yawn forces itself out of my mouth, but I don't want to sleep. I shiver with panic. "If I don't fall asleep, will you stay?"

I hear the pitiful "hmph" in Kim Shin's throat. "I should have left when the sun set, but I decided to stay. _Sin_ won't look for me until tomorrow morning. I just didn't want you to know when I left."

"So you have to be gone by morning?"

Kim Shin nods. "I told you how the hierarchy works, Eun Tak."

"Don't go," I mutter. It's as though he's put a spell on me: I'm suddenly exhausted. I bite my lip to keep from yawning again, but it forces its way out: I can sleep all day tomorrow. I want to stay awake with him until the moment he has to leave.

But I remember my nights with him, sweaty as my shoulders got whenever his arm rested on top of them. In spite of any discomfort I ever felt, all I could imagine now felt like heaven. Exhaustion and the sensation of peace sweep over me like a distilling fire; I drop off almost immediately.

"Saranghae."

"Don't go."


	14. A Failing Heaven

**Guest:** ** _Fighting!_** **Thanks so much for the support! :D I just finished writing, so hopefully updates should be consistent now. :) Enjoy!**

 **Annie815: Loved the heaven reference; thanks for the review! They really help. :)**

 **Guest: I'm glad you stumbled across this, then; I don't speak Korean either, but I felt like** ** _Goblin_** **needed a little more closure. Hope you like it as it finishes!**

 **A/N: I should be updating more frequently now, as I'm adjusting to school schedule; I'll try to keep it consistent on Saturdays until updates are done. Also!: Be thinking of requests for one-shots, anything pertaining to** ** _Goblin_** **that you would like to see. I will be writing those to finish off this story, whether they match with the canon-path of this story or not, any characters you would like featured, any romantic themes you would want. Thanks, and reviews are always welcomed/appreciated! I also have more ideas for** ** _Goblin_** **as well as other K-dramas and fandoms in my profile if you would like to look for what is coming up at some point; I will take requests for what I should work on next.**

 _He commands her body to drift off to sleep; he doesn't want to hurt her by leaving. In spite of his power, she is stubborn enough to stay awake for another thirty minutes. She's muttering something about how she can't go on if he leaves again when her voice suddenly cuts off and her head bounces, limp, against his shoulder._

 _He winces at the impact and reaches to lift her head from his shoulder. But he suddenly misses the contact when the familiar, loving weight is gone; he brings it back to him, presses her exhausted body against his own._

 _For two hours Kim Shin lies there, breathing and bringing her in, forcing fate to let him accept what is his to own. He married her, twice now, and waited eighty years. Now he must wait another . . . one more . . . another year after that . . . between every first snow._

 _But he doesn't want to go on like this forever. He doesn't want her to go on like this forever either._

 _And yet—deep down, he knows_ Sin _was correct. Now as he's helping people, he feels a thirst for life and miracles as he only felt the simple stirrings of before he married Eun Tak again. She can focus on Woo Bin and her family because he is working._

 _Can't he have her every night, though? Why must he live in heaven? Gods have homes on earth; his home and his house are stuck here, his home a sorrowful puddle of tears when she misses him._

 _The sun creaks into his window, announcing the cruel reestablishment of his punishment. He breathes a heavy sigh and lowers his bride onto the bed; she won't be asleep much longer. He's overstayed his leave._

 _But he pauses a moment to brush a stray strand of soft hair from her face before turning for the door. He lets it click quietly behind him, and the moment it does, his power over her releases. He hears the rustle of sheets and clamps his eyes shut. It takes everything he has not to barrel back inside and ask her if she's all right._

 _"_ _Kim Shin?" Her plea begins quietly, then escalates in pain. "Kim Shin?!"_

 _He clenches his fist before he can hear more, and he marches to the door. No; he will not let this go on, visit her one day a year only to watch her heart break. He had to adjust to immortality, and it took a long time. He would never wish that process on any loved one, especially not her, not the creature that means the most to him._

 _He appears inside the door of the Sacred Pillar, nearly smacking into Shi Jin. The soldier doesn't look fazed or surprised, but worried._

 _"_ _You're back late;_ Sin _is not pleased," Shi Jin warns. "He will not let you fight."_

 _Kim Shin ignores him at first, then turns back. "What are you talking about?"_

 _"_ _Do you think I haven't tried to resign my position?" Shi Jin stares at the tiled floor. "Even when Mo Yeon dies, I'll still be here in the Pillar, unable to leave until I'm dismissed. She'll probably forget all about me. I took this up with_ Sin, _and he said I was correct." Shi Jin casts his gaze to the floor. "Apparently there is a punishment for loving."_

 _Kim Shin doesn't ponder Shi Jin's warning for long; this is different. Kim Shin has the status of a god and can argue with_ Sin _if he wishes. Besides, Eun Tak can't forget him._

 _But as he climbes the never-ending stairs to the top, where he's sure_ Sin _will be, his heart sinks: his alternatives from the start were not attractive by any means. Now he has to at least think of a third way._ Sin _won't let him go back; he won't let Eun Tak skip her last two lives; he won't let Kim Shin just rest in peace as a dead soul. Kim Shin is marked with the history of a Dokkaebi. He's different from everyone else._

 _By the time he reaches the top, his energy and his conviction are spent._

 _"_ _Good,"_ Sin _says, stepping out from a pure white corridor. Kim Shin realizes the amount of gold has diminished with every floor he's climbed, as though showing_ Sin _as a creature of purity. He snorts at the thought; hardly true. "You won't have the strength to debate now. Know that you have overstepped your bounds, staying with Eun Tak until daylight. Next time you see her, you only have until midnight. If you are back at the Pillar any later than the time I've designated, I will retract your powers as a god. Restored to the position of a Dokkaebi, you will be banished again to the snowy wastelands where I have no power, and Eun Tak's life will immediately be cut off. She will drink tea and forget about you. Is that understood, Kim Shin?"_

 _Kim Shin bites his tongue until he tastes the sting of metallic blood. He strains not to fight back: he remembers her pained tone this morning and knows he cannot do this forever._

 _But even if_ Sin _cannot offer hope, if there is anything Kim Shin has learned as an immortal it is that nothing can last forever._

 _He leaves_ Sin _without any sort of farewell. He ignores the buzzing pressure in his mind, constantly growing thicker, regarding the people within his range of influence and all of them in need at that moment. Names and situations, situations of life and death, situations of discouragement and failure, flicker through him. But the one that sticks out the most is Eun Tak's name. His powers don't alert him to her situation, but she is the one person he cares about and the one person he can't help._

 _Then Kang Mo Yeon, the woman who tried to save Eun Tak's life, comes back to him. He sighs, exasperated; he hears her name every day, but he doesn't know how to help her. He's tried everything. His powers will show him nothing about her past or future to assist. There's nothing he can do._

 _"_ _Yoo Shi Jin," he murmurs._

 _In minutes, the former soldier appears before him, within reach from anywhere in the Sacred Pillar. "Yes, sir."_

 _"_ _Your wife. Kang Mo Yeon," Kim Shin says. He lifts his eyes to meet Shi Jin's. "What can I do to help her?"_

 _Shi Jin pauses. "She seems happy at the moment, for the most part. She is wealthy, popular, still very beautiful. She works with good people, and she is safe. I don't know why she is showing up to you; she doesn't need help."_

 _Kim Shin's brow furrows. "How do you see her? You aren't a god."_

 _"_ _Everything is visible from heaven, Kim Shin. It would be harder for_ Sin _to be jealous and selfish if he had nothing to take blessings from, nothing to be jealous of, no one else to care about. So he watches everyone below, and it is not hard. You focus on where you are from, if you are not a god. Earth is not hard to remember."_

 _"_ _You didn't drink the tea."_

 _Shi Jin shakes his head. "I did. But_ Sin _said he wanted me to work here, and I entered the Sacred Pillar before the tea took effect. When I leave I will forget more."_

 _"_ _He keeps you here because of Kang Mo Yeon."_

 _Shi Jin doesn't say anything for a long moment, letting the white silence mute the emotions behind his response. "You must understand what it's like, not wanting to forget her." His eyes grow distant, empassioned; Kim Shin caught a glimpse of what Shi Jin might have been like as a soldier, steel but still open. "Not wanting to look at her, confused, when she finally dies and still remembers you, but you've lost track of what your life was like." He bites his lip, and for once he smiles. A flicker of agony lights in Kim Shin's mind, as though his powers are trying to reach the dead as well as the living. But he only administers to the earth, not to the heavens. "Don't worry about it. When she dies I will find some way to resign."_

 _With that, Shi Jin salutes. "Sir." He turns on his heel and marches up the stairs, towards_ Sin; _chances are he's been summoned by some other deity._

 _Kim Shin leaves, discouraged by the whole ordeal. He admits to himself he couldn't have seen Shi Jin's circumstances if he wanted to: he is only meant to help the living._

 _But if Kim Shin can only help the living, ghosts are out of luck. He can't help everyone. He does, however, decide now is the time to get busy. If anything, he has to forget about Ji Eun Tak at least until the next autumn. Heaven could become hell without the ability to let her go._


	15. You Cried Like the Rain

**Thanks so much for the reviews! :D It's late while I'm publishing, so I'm afraid I won't be able to respond directly this time, but I appreciate all of you who are reading and reviewing my story!**

 **This is a long chapter ... and I should have the next one up next Saturday. :) Thanks again!**

I feel him more often, now that I know when he is there. The days blur by; sometimes I feel his arm around me at night. Sometimes I hear his voice in the rain. Sometimes I hear news from locals about miracles they've witnessed, about things done to them they will never forget. I smile whenever I hear about him, but I don't ask questions.

Slowly, bit by bit, I learn to move on. But it does take a long time: before I know it, my mother has passed on; Tae-shin is struggling to pay for college, and I have to help him; Woo Bin is a proud father and owner of Chunwoo Group; I still look the same. During the first few deaths, the deaths of Omma and Sunny and Tae-shin's car accident, it is horrible. I can't get over them for months. I go to graveyards every day, different ones to visit different people. I start to see Grim Reapers, gods, other immortals.

Soon I get used to it. Nights when Kim Shin comes home, the days of the first snow—so few and far between—I can ask questions. He teaches me a lot about Heaven, about the struggles there, although there are not many. He tells me about the system of Grim Reapers, about the different gods, about the Sacred Pillar.

One night, after I've let him go yet again, I realize not only that he is all I have, but that I want to have the life he does. I want to see Heaven someday; I want to know all of these things.

But as I become aimless, without friends or family, I begin to notice more. Colors fade away, then become brighter. People meld into one shape of mindless mortality, then set into individuals with infinite value and defining characteristic. I begin to understand the brilliance of history, the beauty of everything life is and why it is so valuable.

I stare up at the sky often. I wish for the ability to help people as my Dokkaebi has done for so long, to see life the way he saw it. And I've always thought of life as beautiful, but now I really understand.

I hoped often I would lose track of the years, but in waiting for Kim Shin I've counted them excatly, waiting for every day I could see him. 234 years after the granting of my immortality, I stand in front of the building that replaced Kim Shin's beloved library. It is now a technology center, with modern architecture sweeping out from the base of the black glass into two points. It looks incredibly sinister, but rather cool: at least they sell technology in the form of all that remains of books, devices with book equivalents on them.

Technically it's still a book store of some kind. But I can't help recalling the simple, yellow building, even when it did have ivy strewn all over it. I smile up at the dark windows and curved framework, the sleek white calligraphy spelling "Gangam's Book Store" across the top.

My gaze drops to the front doors as they open . . . and my eyebrows knit together. A Grim Reaper ducks inside, his hat on and a stack of death cards in his hand.

In spite of my inner warning to leave this alone, I have to find out what he's doing, if there's anything I can do to help the doomed people inside. I trot across the street and press the metal bar before the doors.

The Grim Reaper waits in a corner of the technology store; upstairs are only offices, and chances are they wouldn't let me in if I wanted to go, so I hope he stays down here in the main store.

There is no receptionist behind the black wooden counter, though. I cock my head, confused. The chair is far away from the desk, as though pushed away in a rush. There's a stack of papers scattered across the floor.

The Grim Reaper looks me up and down, and it takes all I have not to speak to him or stare at him. He looks dangerous, with sharp cheekbones, dark skin, and narrow eyes. I've never met an unpleasant Grim Reaper before, but I shudder at the sight of this one. His hat looks sharper than the standard issue, pointed and shiny. I imagine they've changed their system.

"She fears what she cannot see. Good," the Grim Reaper says.

 _And he talks to himself_ , I thought, letting a little distaste creep into my thoughts.

Finally I decide to let him know I see him, although I'm unsure what he'll do to me. I stare right at him, and his eyes widen. I study him thoroughly.

 _You're an immortal; he cannot do anything._

"Excuse me—," I start.

A loud crash shatters my ears, and I jump. Shrill screams follow, and the Grim Reaper marches past me. I trot to keep up with him, and I hear men shouting. A woman, the original screamer, continues to protest.

"Come on; just a little!" The men laugh, and I shudder; maybe I shouldn't go. Maybe the Grim Reaper is going to take the young woman away. For her sake, I hope so.

Then I realize he has four death cards in his hand.

I slip up behind him and peer into a side closet where the Grim Reaper has positioned himself. There are four men inside, and the receptionist—a slender girl—is trapped between them. She continues to scream hysterically.

"Let go!" she shrieks when one of the men tugs on her hair. Another reaches for her ankle, and she leaps up in a fruitless effort to avoid the contact. One man goes for her business jacket, trying to yank it off her back, and she shrieks again. Guffaws bubble amongst the men.

The Reaper carries four cards, but how are four people going to die here? I might help her if I feel less baffled, but I'm so confused, and I'm just standing there. The Grim Reaper looks slightly uncomfortable, especially when he finds me watching him: then his eyes widen, and he keeps his gaze locked on mine. I defiantly raise my eyebrow at him.

The receptionist's jacket rips off with a loud tear, and she shudders, her shoulders exposed to the closet. The men continue to laugh, and I gag at the sudden stench of alcohol and street filth; they're all drunk.

"Hey!" I call out, just as a tall man whips past me, a long, thick stick in his hand. I can see him from the back only, but I know who he is. My eyes widen, and my jaw drops. I glance outside; I expect to see snow, but there is nothing.

I hear shouting, and I peer around Kim Shin to see what he's doing. He quickly beats the men away from the receptionist with a stick. She scrambles out like a mouse, ducking behind my legs.

"Save me," she squeaks.

For a mouse, she's rather pretty, and I realize why they had her as the receptionist, why she's in this mess now. I kneel down in front of her, patting the top of her head, awkwardly like Kim Shin does to me.

"It's all right," I say. "He'll take care of them, I promise."

She gulps with another squeak. "I can't see a thing. Find my glasses, please; they're at my desk."

Suddenly this territory echoes with forgotten familiarity, the pleadings of ghosts from lifetimes ago. I nod to her and slip back to her desk, giving the Grim Reaper a careful glance. He gives me an angry shrug in response; he's confused as to why I can see him.

Then, as I'm trotting to the receptionist's desk, I realize why the Grim Reaper is here: Kim Shin is going to kill them all.

I gasp and cut off my search for the glasses. I spin back around, race past the receptionist, and snatch the death cards from the Grim Reaper. He protests, but I have to see.

"You won't be able to read them!" he persists. His voice is deep and dark, but he won't do anything to me.

But I can read them, and I flip through all four: one will die from a crushing concussion . . . another from blood loss . . . a third from a fractured skull . . . the last from overdose on alcohol. All because of Kim Shin, save perhaps the last one.

"Kim Shin, stop!" I cry, shoving the cards back at the Grim Reaper. He protests again, his eyes wide, but I ignore him. I leap into the closet, onto my husband's back; I've had plenty of practice whenever he comes back to see me. I see the one that overdosed already on the floor, passed out. Two others have their eyes shut, and my husband halts, his arms raised above the last one.

"Eun Tak?!"

I leap down and turn him around. I wrench the stick from his limp hands and throw it to the side; it collapses on the stomach of one of the men. He moans, and I wince.

"What are you doing?!" I grab Kim Shin's collar. "Why are you killing these men?"

Kim Shin doesn't speak for a long moment, his jaw having fallen. He stares at me, then crushes me close to him.

"Answer my question! You have no right to kill them!" I resist embracing him back for a long moment until he finally squeezes too much sincerity into his contact. I can't help but wrap my arms around him.

"It's been all year," Kim Shin whispers. "I didn't think you could see me."

"So you decided to go out and kill people?"

Kim Shin steps back and frowns. "Do you know what happens to men that are less than animals, Eun Tak? Men that attack the innocent and behave like predators?"

"Kim Shin—,"

"They face the wrath of the gods," he answers simply. "If they deserve to die they should. But how do you know they will die?"

I point to the Grim Reaper behind me. "His cards say they did!" I glance up at the clock; they won't be dead for another half hour at least. "Or will."

"I came to protect Lee Hye Kyo," Kim Shin explains, barely keeping his pride from flaring. I can hear the irritation in his voice, but I can also match it. "I didn't kill any of them yet." He kicks one of them in the side and gets a responsive groan.

The Grim Reaper flips out his cards, then glances at all of them. "Don't worry; they'll be dead soon."

Kim Shin inclines his head as he studies the Grim Reaper. "Reaper Kim."

"Kim Shin."

I blink. "You two know each other?"

"How can she read the cards?!" Reaper Kim yelps. His deep voice does not sound correctly placed when he yelps, and I resist a laugh. "You can't even read them!"

Kim Shin's brow furrows. "You can read them?"

"I _did_ read them," I retort. "And these men are dying. Can't we get them to a hospital?"

"No need," Kim Shin says, absently watching me. He waves his hand out behind him; soon most of them gasp to life, save the one who drank far too much. He takes a little longer, rubbing his head and looking incredibly groggy. I won't ask why he's being merciful right now, because if I do I'm sure he'll change his mind.

"Kim Shin," the Reaper growls. He drops his cards, bows curtly, and marches out the door.

The Dokkaebi's eyes never leave me, curious. But I see amazement behind his eyes, in the vulnerable parts of his mind I've rarely been exposed to, the sweetness behind the rudeness he so often exemplifies.

"Excuse me," Hye Kyo squeaks. "Can you please help me?"

Kim Shin leaves my side immediately and lifts her to her feet. She begins to sob, but he pats her shoulder.

"I know a street gang is the exception to the rule, but when you go home tonight I need you to get out your old suits, the ones that are longer."

The receptionist's nose crinkles as he grabs her glasses. "What?"

"You need to dress less to attract attention if you don't want more punks like that in here," he says. He slips her glasses over her eyes. "They will leave when they awaken; do not pay them mind. Abandon what connections you have. None of your boyfriends or acquaintances are doing you any good. You should pursue the career you want; we both know being admired at the front desk isn't what makes you fulfilled in life."

I look the receptionist up and down; she's very beautiful, and I don't blame her for the deflated look she gets. Her outfit is very pretty, too, a cream colored skirt that reaches her mid-thigh and a simple, dark brown shirt that doesn't quite have sleeves. But I realize Kim Shin is right.

Her eyes water with tears. They look large behind her glasses. "They'll beat me if I leave them. Any of them."

"Be brave," Kim Shin says, although it leaves his tongue with such a drawl I'm fairly sure he says this every day. "Change out of that first; again, try a longer suit with long sleeves. You will look more professional and you will have fewer problems. You don't deserve to be disrespected as you are, and you could make more money working in the way you wish to." Kim Shin removes a sandwich from his trenchcoat pocket; although Minute Sandwich bought out Subway about eighty years ago, Kim Shin doesn't go for the replacement. The wrapping has no company label, and I wonder if the sandwich was made in heaven. "Here. Your fridge is almost empty; if you go buy food tomorrow, you should be fine."

Finally some of the gathered water from the woman's eyes begins to fall. "Thank you," she whispers. "Who are you?"

Kim Shin regards her one more time, then glances back at the men in the closet. He yanks off his trenchcoat, the same dark brown as her shirt, and loops it around her arms. He fits her limp hands through the sleeves. "Button up the coat; it will be cold outside on the way home." He gestures to me, then marches briskly—but with a suave lilt—out the door.

I wave to Hye Kyo and trot out after him.

"Whoa," I say, catching up to him. "That was incredible. Why did you save them?"

He doesn't look at me, walking down the street. "There was a Grim Reaper there and I could irritate him by not killing them."

"Look at you, lying straight to my face!" I laugh as I trot to catch up to him. "You felt soft for them; you're a god of miracles, not murder."

Kim Shin turns to me, his expression deeply solemn. Then I hear a rumble of thunder in the distance, and I glance up.

"No," I moan. "I'm an immortal and I still don't have an umbrella."

Kim Shin snorts, but it sounds empty and sorrowful. "Why not? Wouldn't you have bought one by now?"

I pause, then nod. "I should have, but I keep hoping it won't rain anymore. I keep hoping someday you'll stop being sad."

"It rains all the time!"

"I know."

We both quiet for a moment, and my eyes get lost. His own eyes shimmer, rain threatening to fall from them as well. The first drop hits the road, followed by another and another. Soon the rain is as thick as stone, heavy in my hair and over my face.

" _Sin_ will take you away from me if I stay," he says. "I'm surprised he let you see me, let our paths cross like this."

"Take you away?"

"If I see you more than I should, he will send me back to the wasteland where I went after you pulled the sword from me." My gaze falls; I expect his to do the same, but like the stubborn Dokkaebi he is, he keeps his eyes locked on me. "You will die and move on to your other lifetimes. I'll never be able to see you again."

My eyes travel over his face. For once, we are together and it is not snowing. I would be happy but for the endless rain, almost blocking him from sight.

"I have been useless without you," I whisper. I reach up to his hair; he flinches, as though _Sin_ will erase him with a bolt of lightning and kill me right there and then. But nothing happens, so he cautiously leans into my touch. His hair is so thick and slick against my fingers, hair I recognize but somehow feel so far away from most of the time. "I haven't done anything while you have been away. Woo Bin's descendants are independent, and Sunny is in Heaven now."

Kim Shin smiles his sad smile. "Yes, she is."

"Does she remember you?"

He stares up at the rain. "No. It would cause her to be separated from Wang Yeo; she does not remember her past lifetimes. I can imagine they are in her reach, as she has not sinned, but she has regrets: the Grim Reapers knew it was for the best."

I examine his face as he stares back up into his home, but after what feels like the shortest moment, he jerks away from me. "I know you are lost. But there is nothing I can do; you are immortal, and not within my reach. I have to go."

"I know," I admit. "You always have to go."

He shakes his head. "No, Eun Tak. I saw you at a time that _Sin_ would not have permitted. I have taken too much with you, I have spent too much time with you. He warned me I would be moved to another country if I did this, which I have done. I don't know when I'll come back; I don't know when I'll see you. And I have to go _now_."

I freeze. "Kim Shin . . . no . . ." I reach forward.

He steps back. "Goodbye."

"Kim Shin!"

He steps back, and his form begins to dissolve with the rain.

"On the day of the first snow I will speak to you again," Kim Shin insists. "I will find a way to come back, as I have always done."

"You can't promise that," I protest. "Please! I have no one."

I reach out to touch him, but he has become one with the water. I can't tell if rain or tears fall down his face as he fades from view.

My hand remains, shaking, in the air. He has come and gone hundreds of times, but I'm still not use to the aching sting whenever I realize he is no longer with me; in this case I give a lurch when I realize he's not coming back, not for a long time. Before me, the doors of the book store swing open and Hye Kyo dashes through the rain.

He knew he would be sad.

He still is.

I do not hear his voice over the rain as he said. The storm is quiet save for a few bangs of thunder, flashes of lightning between the clouds, pain crying out for resolution.

Then the rain becomes muffled above me; I look up and see an inky black umbrella.

"You said you had no umbrella," Reaper Kim says. I whip around to face him; he's at least eight inches taller than I am, taller than Kim Shin. "And you said you had no one. Do you even have a home?"

In spite of how frightening the Reaper looks, he is rather caring. I nod. "I live in Kim Shin's home, but I only get to see him once a year."

The Reaper pauses. "The Goblin's Bride."

I blink; no one has called me by my title since my Goblin disappeared from the minds and memories of everyone. No one knows the story anymore; ghosts probably don't either, unless they've been around for over 300 years.

"How long have you been a Grim Reaper? How did you know about me?"

The Reaper shrugs. "Roughly 200 years, give or take. I hear stories about you all the time. Kim Shin causes the most trouble in Heaven, and rumors get down to us. He fights with _Sin_ often, and the head of our department has to deal with him. When Kim Shin gets upset, he disrupts deaths. But he saved me from punishment by superiors, so we have become friends."

I let my gaze fall again. Somehow looking at the ground, avoiding the rain, soothes my heart in a fake sort of way, as though Kim Shin doesn't exist and the rain is just the imaginings of my mind, that I'm not really immortal and I don't really have to live without Kim Shin all the time, that I do have someone at home that loves me.

"I don't often feel sympathy, Ji Eun Tak," Reaper Kim continues, his voice a little awkward. "But knowing what I do about you, how much the Goblin speaks of you and how much it rains here, I want to help."

My head shoots up. "Help with what? Is there something you can do?"

The Grim Reaper suddenly looks hesitant; his face is still frightening, but with the influx of hope I have he doesn't look so frightening. I grab his arm, and he stiffens.

"I can get you into Heaven," he says. "You're an immortal, so you can probably enter a teahouse without punishment. I will not let you into mine, but if you know where another one is, you may go and find it. Go to _Sin_ and consult with him; he enjoys watching those of Earth search for their fate. He constantly shakes things up just to watch what people do, so he will enjoy it if you offer to do something or change your life in exchange for seeing Kim Shin more frequently, or perhaps restoring a status to him he once had, such as the life of a Dokkaebi."

My heart quickens. "So I just need to go through the teahouse? Will any other Grim Reaper let me up there?"

Reaper Kim shrugs. "Perhaps not, but we only have the authority to command the dead; you can do as you please. And if _Sin_ asks, tell him Reaper Kim permitted you inside—he cannot question us all and he will have no idea which Reaper allowed you inside."

"You all have the same name? Doesn't that—?" I cut myself off. Unfair as the system of Grim Reapers is, I can't do anything about it. "All right. Thank you, Reaper Kim."

He lets loose a tease at a grin, but no more. "Here," he says. "Keep the umbrella."

I grab the handle, and he lowers his hat onto his head. "And if you see Kim Shin again anytime soon, tell him I don't owe him any favors for saving my position." He turns away and quickly fades in the pouring rain.

In spite of the beating storm, I shudder with renewed energy I haven't felt in a long time. I race down the street after Reaper Kim: I know I won't be able to find him, but it's a way to go. He symbolizes light to me, even if he's dressed in black. Perhaps he will point me to another Reaper's teahouse.

But quickly I reach the junction where I died so long ago; it doesn't look exactly the same, with new forms of technology dominating the streets, but I know where to find the Reaper's teahouse from here. Lee Hyuk—or Wang Yeo, I suppose—lived there at the time. It's still a few blocks away, but I'm determined enough to get there.

I slide around on the soaked sidewalks, and scramble to a halt just before I would faceplant in the shining roads a few times. I finally fold up the umbrella and use it for balance, racing across bridges and streets with the rain pelting my face, as though _Sin_ sent it to halt my progress.

Finally I reach the corner where the teahouse sits; the door is open wide to me, as though expecting me. The umbrella basket by the door is empty, and I assume this is where Reaper Kim works. Well . . . Reaper Kim, that is, the friend of my Dokkaebi. I fold up the umbrella and thank the empty, warm, dry teahouse before lowering my gift into the basket.

I shut the door behind me and wander inside. The air is darker and more sinister than when Lee Hyuk lived here. I almost fear the chill in the room; perhaps this Reaper has a darker history than even Wang Yeo, or perhaps doesn't understand what life is truly worth just yet.

I look around for the door to Heaven before I remember it's right behind me. I turn back and grab the knob . . . and I see blue, clouded sky ahead. I blink rapidly; I don't know if this is the right way, but I pray briefly to any deity that might be listening and lift the knocker on the door. The door swings open for me, and I press forward to a massive, stone staircase. I squint up into the bright light beyond, but I cannot see where the stairs end.

I only convince myself to keep going when I realize this may be my only chance to bring Kim Shin back into my life, my only chance to tell _Sin_ how I feel and what my fate truly is.

After what feels like a longer eternity than I've been alive, I finally reach the top of the stairs. My legs ache and my eyes are sore from the beautiful but searing light all around me. I slump to a sitting position at the top; when I stare back down, I can only see sky and clouds. The teahouse has disappeared. I only hope _Sin_ can't trace me back to Reaper Kim; I don't want him punished for helping me.

I face Heaven, and my jaw drops. Not only am I stunned by the city, I'm simply confused. I thought Heaven would look different from Earth, but when I think about it, taking only the good things about Earth would make a heavenly place. Perhaps this is why life is precious: it never truly ends, and finding the heavenly things of life helps you to create eternal pleasure for yourself and everyone around you.

I find the most lovely and pristine building, and I assume it's the Pillar: it reflects the light of whatever gives Heaven its shine. If the sun is responsible, I cannot find it anywhere in the endless sky. I wander to the front step of the building.

Kim Shin told me _Sin_ is at the top. I suck in a breath, then slowly release it: I'm afraid of messing up, and certainly afraid of making matters worse for Kim Shin and for our future, but this can be done. I believe the Grim Reaper, and if there is any way to make things better it will be worth it.

When I enter, a young man greets me. I have a flash of realization and vision, and I see images of him deep in my mind. I squint at him, unsure where these visions are coming from.

"Ji Eun Tak," he says. "Ji Min-hee. Goblin's Bride."

I nod. "Yes. Are you _Sin_?" I shake suddenly, wondering if _Sin_ really looks so vulnerable, so young, so human.

He shakes his head. "No. I am here to tell you that _Sin_ says you can find no change here. He wants you to go back home."

I begin to slump, but then I stiffen up stubbornly.

"I will see him."

The young man resists a smile. "He knew you would say so. Come with me, please."

Having expected to be thrown out at my persistence, I am rendered frozen for a brief moment. "He'll still let me see him?"

"No," the young man says. "But Kim Shin has offered to help me on multiple occasions, and while he can do nothing I am more than glad to do something for him."

I slow again; it is like Kim Shin to help people, but it isn't like other people to attempt paying him back for what he's done. This is the second person today; I wonder if it is a trait of immortals or if they just happen to know who he is and what they can do for him. He is a god of miracles and wealth, after all.

I grin at the memory, when we discussed his sister in my first lifetime. "The god of wealth visited her store," I said to him. I couldn't have known at the time how accurate I'd been.

"Shi Jin, leave us."

The young man and I spin around at the quiet, piercing voice. A man of rather medium size in a shadowy cloak and a white robe stands there. He isn't distinct other than the blackness covering his face and the immediate command his presence gives.

My escort salutes. "Sir. Yoo Shi Jin." Then he turns and walks away, giving me one last sympathetic look.

I waste no time. _"Sin_ , please, if you could just understand—,"

"I know everything, Eun Tak: every petition you have, every pain of your heart, every reward you think you deserve, every punishment you actually deserve." He does not sound angry, just apathetic. He waves me off. "Do not look to me for salvation in this situation: there is nothing you can do for Kim Shin. He is no longer a Dokkaebi, and thus feels completely empowered. There are no weaknesses in him save you."

" _Sin_ , I need him. My immortality is nothing without him; if nothing else, will you please bring me to Heaven? Let him see me; let me see him. You are inflicting too much punishment." Normally I might have winced at my own forwardness, but he needs to hear this. He needs to hear the pain of the last few hundred years.

"No." _Sin_ glances at me. "Both of your answers have been insufficient. You have not even begun to try and unlock your fate; you've been stuck on the answer to the last lifetime. If you and Kim Shin could seek your purposes together, I would not be stubborn about this. But you are obviously incapable. For three years, you stayed with each other without regard for anyone or anything else. Every time I let him go back, he stretches the rules for your benefit. If he really loved you more than himself, he would let you forget him."

The words sting, but I march past them: of course Kim Shin cares for me. "He knows I would rather remember him than forget and move on."

"Leave before I deepen your punishment," _Sin_ retorts coolly.

The clack of high heels fills the hall. I glance over _Sin's_ shoulder, only to find that slim lady in the red dress who gave me spinach in my first lifetime.

"Hello, Ji Eun Tak," she says with a gentle smile. I barely have time to acknowledge her greeting before she crosses her arms and gives _Sin_ a dark glare. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Punishing the Dokkaebi as is my right and obligation." Again, he sounds undeterred.

"He's not a Dokkaebi anymore," she argues. "And this is his bride. You set his fate, and now you rip it out from under him!" She gives me a sympathetic glance before returning to her glare. "If she is willing to fight for Kim Shin, let her do it."

 _Sin_ finally turns to her. "How so?"

"Let her create a Dokkaebi."

I blink. "What?"

"A Dokkaebi is formed when the blood of a person and a spirit come into contact with each other upon a mutual object," the woman explains, as though she's gone through this multiple times. "But you cannot guarantee such a process will happen with Kim Shin a second time; what you can do is find his sword. There is a chance it will turn him into a Dokkaebi once again, should _someone_ allow it _._ " She directs this last statement at _Sin._

He doesn't relax, but he does seem to consider for a moment. "Turning him into a Dokkaebi wouldn't help," he says finally.

The woman throws her hands in the air. "Well, what are you going to do about this, then?! They'll both be purposeful thorns in your side until you give up."

 _Sin_ ponders. "Perhaps you are right. Yes, Samshin, you are right." He turns back to me, and I square my shoulders in spite of myself. "Find Kim Shin's sword and bring it back here. Then we will further discuss this. I will tell you how you can uncover your fate."

"I don't know where to find it," I say.

"Then you'd best start looking," _Sin_ says. He sounds proud of himself, the only change of inflection in his voice this entire time, and he nods to Samshin before wandering casually down the hallway.

"Look for the Reaper who sent you here," Samshin says. "Between him and Kim Shin, they know where the sword is. I confess I do not know how to get there, but the Reaper might."

"Thank you, Ma'am." Then I pause. "Why are you helping me? Why have you ever helped me?"

"My dear child." She smiles a brilliant, beautiful smile before reaching forward. Her finger brushes my cheek. "Your mother was happy when she was pregnant with you . . . and her joy did not even know mine. You are one of my favorite creations; I've grown fond of you. I know how upset you've been these last few years, and that you haven't been fulfilling your purpose. But whatever _Sin_ has in mind, selfish and cruel as it may seem now, will lead you to the fate you were always meant to possess."

She turns away, but I stop her. "Wait. About the Reaper . . . I want to help him if he is going to help me."

Samshin's smile widens. "Your destiny has begun, Ji Eun Tak." Her smile lowers to a polite size before she continues. "His name is Seo Dae Young, and that is all you need to know."

I want to ask her more, but she embraces me. My mouth drops open, as I don't know how to process this. She turns and glides away in her red high heels before I can say anything more.


	16. Standing for Yourself

**So sorry it's been so long! :O I did not take into account that college would be as crazy as it is, but hey: life can change. :) Again, I am so sorry for any waiting; next time remind me, and I will post the minute I get the reminder.**

 **To the reviews-**

 **Laughy-Taffy the Grape: Thanks so much! That is one of the happiest things I've heard all day, I'm so glad the characterization came out right. :D I appreciate your review!**

 **tichu: I guess we'll find out. ;) Thank you for your time, and I hope you enjoy!**

 **Whovian413: *GASP* You're Korean? That's so freaking awesome! No, don't worry about it; in fact, I went and looked it up after I wrote the chapter ... and I forgot to change it before I published. XD So thanks for reminding me! I've amended my error, I think ... but I'm glad you're enjoying the story! Again, 감사합니다** **! (assuming I spelled that correctly)**

Sin's _obvious choice is to send the Goblin to Canada, but the moment Kim Shin arrives there not only does he realize it's on the opposite side of the world from Korea: it is the very center of his love with Ji Eun Tak in her first lifetime. It's the place he fell in love with her, the place she teased him about their "honeymoon," the place she remembered him, the place he has come back to so much._

 _Everything reminds him of her. His powers point to Quebec the most, and he knows_ Sin _is messing with him._

Sin's _discussion with Eun Tak comes back to him, over and over: he heard them a little before he left. He knew emerging from the hallway would not do him any favors, much as he wanted to see her._

 _"_ _If he loved you more than himself, he would let you forget him."_

 _He left immediately after; the sting coursed more deeply than he wants to acknowledge, but now the ache refuses to go away, especially as his thoughts spin around like hornets in his head. He can't shake the idea that maybe he only kept her alive for him; maybe she'd be happier now, not crying so much, not in so much pain, if he just let her die. He could have gotten her back if he let her die. He could have figured something else out._

 _He bites his lip; he needs to put the focus on her to find out if_ Sin _is correct. What would Eun Tak want? She would be happier without him, without being forced to obey the rules of_ Sin _regarding her Dokkaebi husband. She will find someone like Tae-hee if he gives her up now, and he can rest in peace like he always should have._

 _But isn't this what she wanted?_

 _He realizes he never asked her if she wanted to die._

 _Alerts in his mind, prayers from hundreds of French, Korean, Canadian, and American voices in Quebec shout at him. He breathes in and out to concentrate, to allow his face into solemnity before he works for strangers. But her beautiful, brilliant smile doesn't leave his thoughts: what if he's broken that smile? She isn't carrying on without him as she should be._

 _As he hands out sandwiches, greets people with varying backgrounds, suffers through endless and repetitive questioning, leaves those who have collapsed to their knees, he can't leave the issue alone._

 _Finally the crying voices in his mind begin to quiet. He still has more work to do, but as the sun rises, sets, rises, and sets again . . . he knows he has to make a decision. He knows he has to let her go. He keeps her because he loves her, but what if it's for his own good?_

 _When_ Sin _lets him go home he'll talk to her, ask her what he should do. Perhaps he should have done it in the first place and saved her centuries of pain._

Sin _arrives more quickly than Kim Shin expected; he comes through the same door Kim Shin did, the one in a bright but less crowded cobble street. Kim Shin resists startling when_ Sin _walks in . . . looking like Duk Hwa._

 _"_ _Duk Hwa has been reincarnated?" Kim Shin asks, reining in his irritation._

Sin's _mouth twitches. His eyes darken, and he looks more than powerful when he speaks. "You mean you didn't know? Tae-shin was Duk Hwa's third lifetime. This is his final one, born to a couple in the United States; he's too good-looking to change between lives."_ Sin _pauses, letting his power flood the air. He wants to make a point, Kim Shin knows, but he feels too weak to glare or retort before_ Sin _continues. "I came to ask what you wish to do regarding the Goblin's Bride."_

 _Kim Shin's guard trembles, and a twitch ripples through his eyes. He reinforces himself with his pain and finally breaks loose. "I make no wish. I will see her. I will do my best to make her happy. I will rid myself of your punishments; I've been suffering them for almost 2000 years with no respite in my life. I will find a way to make my life my own without your every move shaking the very elements on which I thrive."_

Sin's _eyebrow shoots up, and he chuckles. Kim Shin wants to kick the amusment right out of him, and he clenches his fists._

 _"_ _Well, Kim Shin, you finally stood up for yourself," he says. But he doesn't sound relenting; Kim Shin studies him suspiciously. "But you are powerless. I have asked you a new question, and I desire an answer."_

 _"_ _I will speak to her before I make any decision," Kim Shin says. Energy crackles between the gods, a soundless war between rebellion and authority._

 _"_ _I can't arrange that. Eun Tak is beyond my reach now; she has departed with a friend of yours, one Reaper Kim, in search of your sword."_

 _Kim Shin stiffens. "Why?"_

 _"_ _I told her I would negotiate your state of affairs if she retrieved the sword; it could benefit me in guiding her towards her fate."_

 _"_ _Her fate?"_

Sin _sighs, exasperated. "You never asked, Kim Shin. I am content with your position; you are working well, doing as you were designed to do. But I need another answer on her behalf. She still thinks about you, and the light inside her is fading. I am separating you two again for her benefit, not because there is something wrong with you. If she moves on, perhaps she can redeem herself. I'm warning you now, Dokkaebi, that you need to decide what to do with yourself for her sake."_

 _Kim Shin chuckles sourly under his breath. "Samshin warned me of the same a long time ago, to let myself die so she could live. And we found a way around it. I'm sure we can do the same now."_

 _"_ _If she finds the sword I will order her to kill you."_

 _"_ _She won't listen to you."_

 _"_ _If she thinks it will turn you back into a Dokkaebi she will."_

 _Kim Shin's eyes narrow. "But it won't."_

Sin's _grin swells into a smug stretch. "Of course not. But it will take your power from protecting her immortality, and she will forget all about you once she dies. That sword is still covered with blood and ghosts; it will send you into probation until you are willing to forget her and move on as she will have done with you."_

 _Submission creeps into Kim Shin's chest, breaking down the threads of his conviction. He's been beaten and he knows it; Eun Tak is no longer his, no matter what he does. Whether or not she knows it, she will be happier without him . . . but he knows he will not be happier without her. Even in a new state of godhood, even if the sword does allow him to rest in peace, he will have no companion like her._

 _Kim Shin lowers his head. "Save her the trouble of finding the sword. I will release my hold on her and accept the fate you've given me, including the probation; just let me warn her first, spend one last day and night with her."_

 _"_ _Not that much time,"_ Sin _says._

 _"_ _You truly are selfish."_

 _"_ _You may be surprised."_ Sin _marches right through Kim Shin's antagonism. "You can tell her in less time, Dokkaebi." Then he pauses. "I give you two days. You have two days to spend however you wish; I will not punish you for any action taken during them. Two days starting now, you may look for her, speak to her, do whatever you wish. But two days more of her idle avoidance of her fate is all I will accept; then she will be set on a path far away from you. I will come to accept your offer."_

 _Kim Shin nods, and doesn't think to thank_ Sin _before marching right through the door. Samshin waits on the other side, just outside of the Sacred Pillar._

 _"_ _Where is Ji Eun Tak?"_


	17. Diverge

**My apologies! It's been, like, three months! :O And I am so sorry about that ... I admit life has gotten a little bit crazy. But here's the next chapter; hopefully it shouldn't be more than two or three weeks until the next one. Feel free to get on my case if I don't update fast enough.**

"I am not taking you there." Reaper Kim throws his dishtowel on the black wooden counter and walks towards the door. "The sword is in a desolate wasteland where _Sin_ has no control; it is a place of probation, not in Heaven, Earth, or Hell. It is a place constructed in the mind of the individual soul, a place where you go if you are no longer on the path to happiness or misery. You just sort of . . . fade away."

"So how do I get there?" I prod. "I still have to get there."

Reaper Kim's eyes ease shut, exasperated. "You don't. Eun Tak, you would have to die to get there. And you would just come right back here to the teahouse if you attempted to die . . ." He pauses. "Except that you are an immortal."

I nod, agitated and ready to find the sword. Even if I don't use it, Samshin mentioned my fate would be better than my present course, that perhaps even the selfish _Sin_ intended to use this for my good and happiness. "So if I'm killed as an immortal?"

" _Sin_ will decide what to do with you. Only a Dokkaebi or misguided ghost would be sent to a state of probation where _Sin_ could not reach them." The Reaper shakes his head. "No. You can't go, and I can't take you there."

"Would Kim Shin know how to get there?"

The Reaper shrugs. "I don't know."

Before the Reaper can explain more, the door of the teahouse slams open, and Kim Shin stumbles inside. The stairs behind him are again illuminated with life.

"Eun Tak, don't worry about going," Kim Shin says hastily. "I've already made my decision."

I stand, nearly throwing the chair over. "What are you talking about?"

" _Sin_ has given us two days to spend together; then you have to go and find your fate. I'll release you from your immortality. You'll be free to go; I promise." He walks briskly over to me and drags me right into his arms. "I'll let you go."

I shove him away. "What are you talking about? I'm going to find the sword and ask _Sin_ what he wants. I'm sure there's something we can do. If nothing else, I'll stay the way I am; it's worth it to see you once in a while."

"But you won't," Kim Shin protests, gripping my wrists. " _Sin_ wants you to find your fate, and he wants me to be far away from you. He may be self-centered, but he knows what's best for everyone. You would be happier without me, and . . . and if I forget about you, you can be even happier, knowing you don't have to feel any guilt."

"I wasn't happy until I _met_ you." I rip my hands from his fingers.

"What will finding the sword even do for you? You aren't planning to use it . . . are you?"

I nod. "I am. If I can't turn you into a Dokkaebi, I can make you a mortal." I swallow, hoping my guess is at least somewhat correct. "Can't I?"

Kim Shin looks broken. "Yes. Yes, you can; you can make me just like anyone else with the sword. I won't turn into a Dokkaebi if you try to kill me. But you still only have less than two days to get to the sword before _Sin_ causes you to die."

"I'll get there." Then I pause. "Reaper Kim says it's in the wasteland where you stayed for nine years; how do I get to it?"

Kim Shin blinks rapidly. "What? You—you want to get there? Eun Tak . . . you can't get there."

"I thought so as well," Reaper Kim mutters.

Kim Shin and I both turn to him; I hadn't heard him leave, but he stands at the bottom of the stairs. He gestures to the stairs. "Apparently Yoo Shi Jin knows how to get there. It is where all of the lost venture; it is where _Sin_ found him. Because he left Kang Mo Yeon behind, and because she's slowly forgetting him, Shi Jin is still partially lost in that space. He can take Eun Tak."

I turn back to Kim Shin. "Keep working, and keep talking to _Sin._ I will bring the sword back; I will make you mortal again; when I die I will see you in Heaven." I hold out my necklace. "'Destin,' remember? A match made in Heaven. Even if you were on your last lifetime and I still have two left, _Sin_ can't undo us if we've been through this much."

Kim Shin's eyes dart between mine. I can imagine he's considering, and I pray he's leaning towards letting me go. Finally he crushes me in a sudden kiss; my eyes fly open until his intent deepens against my mouth. My vision eases to black, and my fingers subconsciously lower against his neck. It hits me at last that this may be all we have, and I press up against him.

Thankfully Reaper does not make any disgusted comment.

The warm softness of Kim Shin's lips parts from me, and my lungs freeze—shocked—for a long moment, as though I can live on the kiss alone and breath no longer does me any good.

"Be careful," Kim Shin whispers, his forehead pressed against mine.

"I'll come back," I assure him, rubbing his shoulders. "I always have, and I always will. We can make this work."

Reaper tosses his head towards the stairs, and I tear away from Kim Shin to follow. My Dokkaebi's eyes follow me as I begin my long trek up the stairs again.

" _Neoege naega gagetda,"_ I whisper. _I will go to you._


	18. Fate is a Question

**Well, it's sure been an eternity! My deepest apologies for the long wait; I've been having a coming-of-age story of my own, and it's rather exciting, if not the most stressful time of my life. :D And I'm sorry this chapter is so short; I'll have the next one up in a few days. Reviews are appreciated! Love you all! And sorry for the formatting problem ... I don't know what's been going on.**

 _Kim Shin watches her go, and knows that kiss is all he'll get out of her for eternity. He waits for what feels like years for her and Reaper Kim to go up the stairs after Yoo Shi Jin . . . and then he follows._

 _He drags his steps on his way to the Sacred Pillar. He feels resigned to this, but he has no other choice: he has warned her. He said his goodbye. She'll be happier without him, and he'll be happier knowing, before he forgets her, that she is content._

Sin _is at the door._

 _"She left already, Dokkaebi,"_ Sin _says, casual. He leans against the doorframe, still concealed in shadow._

 _"I'm aware," Kim Shin says. He drops to his knees. "Take my powers,_ Sin _. I surrender."_

Sin _chuckles. "Satisfying as it is to know the proud and rebellious Kim Shin is on his knees before me after hundreds of years, I cannot. I made a deal with you: you still have eighteen hours. I suggest you use it to start forgetting about her, or perhaps go find her in Probation. You've been there; you know where it is in your mind."_

 _"No." Kim Shin shakes his head. "I said my farewell, and I have submitted to you."_

Sin _leans back. "Fair enough. You seem to have no hope in her ability."_

 _"The sword is not there," Kim Shin protests. "I've been all over that wasteland. I don't know how it could possibly be there."_

 _"You saw it. I know you did."_

 _Kim Shin doesn't understand, but a lick of hope betrays the stone in his heart: what if she finds it? Perhaps there's a way out. But_ Sin _also might just be wasting their time, lying to Kim Shin just to have satisfaction._

 _"Are you helping me or tricking me?"_

Sin _shrugs. "Perhaps that is the question I've asked you. Why don't you let her find out?"_


	19. Buried Dead

**It's been over a year ... sorry. :D I changed my major and got married and took a months-long trip to China. But here's the next chapter; I'll hopefully have another up in a week or so. Thanks for sticking with me; I appreciate all of you.**

Yoo Shi Jin folds his arms and gives me a concerned look. "Eun Tak . . . you don't want to go there."

"Seriously!" I throw my hands in the air. "People keep telling me that! But I do; I want to help my Dokkaebi. I'm not going to lose him; take me there. Please. I have to find the sword I pulled out of him."

Shi Jin throws a glance at Reaper Kim, who simply shrugs in return.

"Wouldn't you do this to get Mo Yeon back?" I plead. "Wouldn't you go there—anywhere for her? Wouldn't you risk anything?"

Shi Jin's past flickers into my vision again, and I blink: I see images of him in a camoflauge soldier outfit, of aiming a gun at my doctor's shoulder, of them in the back of a truck. I'm only aware of my own existence for how my brow creases; why am I seeing all of this?

"Eun Tak?"

The forged reality fades from before me, and I stare into Shi Jin's eyes. I nod to him.

"I'm ready," I say.

Shi Jin's jaw locks open, like he wants to protest again. But he glances out the window of the Pillar . . . and I see Doctor Kang on the street, laughing and talking with another young woman.

"Does she know you're here?"

Shi Jin twitches. "What?"

"Does Doctor Kang know you're in the Pillar?"

He nods. "But she will soon forget about me if she drank the tea; she saw me when she first came here, but most dead spirits aren't allowed inside. They wouldn't want to be here anyway; Hell is in the lower levels, where those who are too miserable to be around other spirits have gone." His gaze shifts to the ceiling. "Sometimes I feel like Hell trickles up here, like we can only have happiness if we forget all of the beautiful things of life."

Again, I feel like the system of death is a little unfair . . . not much, but it still pains me to see all of this.

Shi Jin gestures towards himself. "Come; I'll take you to Probation."

I trot after him, but the moment I reach him he grabs my wrist. Reaper Kim lowers a hand onto my shoulder, and the world falls from beneath me. The breath rushes from my lungs as I fall, so I can't scream or cry out for help.

I never feel the impact of falling, just the slow creep of the cold over my shoulders. I shiver uncontrollably; it surrounds me as though my clothes are made of damp ice. I shudder again, struggling to stand; my muscles gasp for life, but they seize up with the cold.

My eyes struggle to open, and I almost think I've gone blind: the black of my vision is replaced with blank white. There are no details anywhere, but then a flurry of snowflakes races across my eyes.

A hand wraps around mine, so warm that it stings. My lungs release from the packed snow caging my ribs, and I suck in a mouthful of air. The air freezes my throat, as though I'm eating ice.

"Come on," Reaper Kim says. "It's been snowing here for a long time, so the sword may not be retrievable. We'd better get started."

I'm worried Yoo Shi Jin isn't there, but when Reaper Kim brings me to my feet I realize he's with us.

"Do you have any idea where this sword might be?" Shi Jin asks. "Neither you nor Reaper Kim are meant to be here; it could become dangerous if you stay too long. If you start getting dizzy or tired—or even hopeless, you might never leave." His expression grows somber. "So warn me if something seems to go wrong, if you feel strange. And you need to listen to me." He stares mostly at me, only flicking his gaze to Reaper Kim once in a while. "If I tell you to leave, you need to leave, even if we haven't found the sword yet."

I nod. "Of course." Then I smile. "We do, after all, only have a day and a half. I think we'll find it."

Yoo Shi Jin doesn't look convinced, but he nods to me anyway. "Only a day and a half . . . do you have any idea where to start? Did you receive any visions . . . anything? Any hints at all?"

I shake my head. I realize, then, that I've been too optimistic for what the circumstance calls for. I don't know where to even begin looking, and Kim Shin didn't even know about the sword coming here.

But I remember what Shi Jin said about feeling hopeless. The more optimistic I can be, the more quickly we can find this.

"Sin seemed to believe in my ability to find it," I say. "So there's a chance . . . and if there's any way for me to be with Kim Shin again I will take it."

The bitter chill of the snowy air doesn't get to me very quickly, or so I assume at first: sure, it's uncomfortable. Yes, it is difficult to see anything in the snow. Our method of searching in a tightly knit group grows wearying after very little time, but I keep my thoughts on light, on optimism. I try to notice details about the land in case I start going around in circles: there appears to be a waterfall of snow cascading from emptiness into a deeper chasm. In spite of the dizzy dryness of this terrible place, there is sunlight, a simple, white disk in the gray sky. It never seems to rise or set, just fade in and out with the onset of storm and calm.

"Why is there no way to tell time here?" I ask once.

As though I expected myself to be alone, I jolt at Shi Jin's response. "Time is a tool of both hope and misery; if you await something hopeless, time is difficult to process. But most often time is a way for the miserable to know that their hopelessness will end. Probation is a place without hope; it is a place without time. Watching the sun move gives you a sense of progress, regardless of what you are or aren't doing, regardless of whether or not you have the strength to move on." I can't see him until I have the strength to peer through the blizzard, and then I see him forging his way towards me through the snow. "Which means we must hurry. If you are beginning to notice this, we've probably overstayed your welcome here."

"Well, then we should get moving," I say, trying to rush the cheer back into my voice: I can stay optimistic for a while longer, I'm sure. Then I halt in place, my ankles locked in a pound of snow.

"Wait . . . where's the Reaper?"

Shi Jin turns in place, and I follow, but there is nothing to be seen more than the endless emptiness of our blizzard cage.

"I wonder if he's gone looking for something," I wonder, but Shi Jin's eyes shoot wide open.

"Reaper! Grim Reaper!" He gestures to me hurriedly. "Come on; if he gets lost, he can't get out of here." He turns back towards the snow and begins trotting away. "Reaper! Reaper!"  
Panic flares in my chest, and I race after him. "Reaper!"

I only hope we can find him and the sword.

Positive attitude, I remind myself, gritting my teeth against the cold. Positive attitude. We can get through this . . . we can get through this.


End file.
